Breaking Hope
by Sakiru Yume
Summary: Pain. Sorrow. Hatred. To always feel all of those emotions would be hell. Hell. That's a funny world. Where nothing matters and everything makes sense. Sequel to Pain of Life
1. The Upcoming Darkness

_**I'm not sure if it has been exactly a week, but here it is. It took me forever to decide on the name of the story. If you haven't read "Pain of Life", read it. This is the sequel and Pain of Life will make this easier to understand. If you have, please enjoy this story.**_

_**Oh yeah, I'm sorry if this took over a week. I'm trying as best as I can. Also, I'm not sure if I'll post five chapters today because I don't have five chapters done. Sorry about that.**_

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_The shadows are closing in._

"You are in charge of keeping Sakura Mikan from the AAO prior to and during the invasion."

"Hai. I'll take my leave now."

"Very well."

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"Ne, ne Kanjouinyuu-chan, where were you?" Mikan asked Oujou energetically.

Oujou groaned. _She still calls me Kanjouinyuu-chan. _"Nowhere."

"You had to be _somewhere_." Mikan whined.

As Oujou passed Natsume, she muttered, "I'm in charge of protecting her." For a month now Natsume had been training Oujou to fight. Oujou, already being partially proficient in martial arts, was a quick learner. Every night Natsume fought her without using his alice. Half the time Oujou got knocked out and the other half she could barely drag herself to bed. One thing that she did notice was that she always woke up in her bed, even after being knocked out.

When Oujou took her customary seat in front of Natsume, he took his seat as well. He leaned forward and hissed in her ear. "Training from seven to eleven." Oujou spun around. Natsume was smirking at her.

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"We have no idea when the AAO will attack, so we are switching to this training schedule. Begin." Natsume flew at Oujou and she defended herself, then attacked back.

Four hours later… 

"Training's over." Oujou fell over, her right arm on fire (not literally). The skin was completely ripped off and blood was pouring out. Natsume lifted her up, then took off in the trees.

"I can walk for myself."

"Fine." Natsume put her on a tree limb, the stood watching. Oujou tried to jump forward, stumbled, lurched forward, and fell. Natsume caught her, then took off again. Oujou struggled for a moment the, seeing it was fruitless, let him carry her.

After opening her window, Natsume set Oujou on the ground in a standing position, the vanished. Oujou collapsed on the floor, a pool of blood staining the carpet.

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_Bring… Bring…Bring!!! _Oujou's shrill alarm clock went off, waking her up. Oujou's hand gripped her covers and – _COVERS?_ Oujou sat bolt upright, causing a stab of pain in her right arm. She looked down and saw that her arm was wrapped in bandages. Oujou got up, slipping on her other uniform (The one not covered in blood). She winced when the sleeve caught on the bandage.

Oujou walked to the classroom and still go there ten minutes early. Natsume, Ruka, Iinchou, and Hotaru were the only ones in the room.

"Thank you."

"Hn," Oujou sat down, her head hurting from the odd barrage of worry, embarrassment, and greed. Nastume was both embarrassed and worried, where as Ruka and Iinchou were just worried. Hotaru, of course, felt the greed.

Suddenly something caught Oujou's eye. A person clad in all black was standing on a tree, staring into the classroom. Oujou cursed, then spun around, mouthing the words, "Protect Mikan" to Natsume. Then she ran out of the room, followed closely by Natsume.

_Protect Mikan._

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_**Ooh, please review. I hope you liked it. I know, it was kinda short. Gomenasai.**_


	2. Seeing Darkness

_**OK, I hope that you enjoyed the previous chapter. I've been working for a while on these. I'll post the next one today, too.**_

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_In my darkest hours I could not foresee  
That the tide could turn so fast to this degree  
Can´t believe my eyes  
How can you be so blind?  
Is the heart of stone, no empathy inside?  
Time keeps on slipping away and we haven´t learned  
So in the end now what have we gained?_

_-Our Solemn Hour_

Oujou stood in a tree about thirty feet behind the sakura tree. From there she had a clear view of Mikan and Natsume. Natsume had dragger Mikan out there, deciding that he could actually protect her when other people couldn't get involved.

Mikan was chatting away, completely oblivious to any danger there had been. A mysterious person had appeared, obviously not from the school. Oujou had immediately left to apprehend him, but he had vanished.

Mikan cut off suddenly, her head falling onto Natsume's shoulder. Natsume shook her shoulder, evidently trying to wake her up.

"Oi, Polka dots. Polka dots, wake up. Mikan!" There was movement behind Oujou and she spun around. A boy wearing all black and a black mask was standing on the branch behind her. Oujou could now feel his fear and his worry that had been drowned out by Natsume's. They boy leapt from tree to tree and Oujou followed, trying to catch up.

Suddenly the boy spun around and stuck his hand out. Oujou was hit with a sudden wave of fatigue and blacked out.

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Oujou stood up and stumbled to the classroom. She tripped her way to her seat and sat down, putting her head in her hands. She was asleep before she hit the table.

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"Oujou, wake up. C'mon Oujou, wake up." Oujou opened one eye and saw Iinchou next to her shaking her shoulder.

"You're bleeding," he said worriedly.

"And?" She asked sleepily.

"You need to go to the infirmary." Iinchou pulled at her shirt urgently.

"No, I don't," Oujou put her head down, ready to go back to sleep. Iinchou pulled her into standing position and began to drag her towards the infirmary. Oujou was mildly surprised at his strength, but was too tired to care.

As Oujou stumbled blindly forwards, she felt a large burst of fear that matched the boy before. She tried to pull away, but her strength was greatly diminished and she couldn't. When they reached the infirmary, Iinchou let go of her arm. Oujou fell forward onto her knees, panting heavily. Imai Subaru came out and knelt on one knee, his face level with hers.

"What happened?" He asked.

"I fell thirty feet from a tree after getting the top layer of skin ripped off of my arm yesterday. Where's Natsume?" Iinchou shrugged, but Subaru was too busy taking the pain from and healing her arm to respond. Oujou sharply pulled her arm back then ran out of the room, searching for Natsume. She raced out to the sakura tree where Natsume often sat.

"Hyuuga!" She called. Natsume looked up in surprise. "Where's Mikan?"

"Asleep in my room with the door and windows locked. You're bleeding."

"I _know_. That's what happens when you get beaten up by the best fighter in the school then fall thirty feet from a tree while unconscious. " Natsume grabbed her wrist and began pulling her towards the school.

"Why are you worried about me?" She asked.

"I don't want you to become another me."

Oujou laughed shortly. "Yeah, like that hasn't already happened. Hm, lets see: going to die prematurely, does missions for the school, etc…do we have training tonight?"

Natsume raised an eyebrow. "Of course. It's different tonight." At Oujou's confused expression, Natsume smirked. "You'll see."

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_**I'm evil, aren't I? Well, I hope you enjoyed it. It took a while and a lot of spacing out during class to get this done, so it had better be good. The next chapter will be up soon.**_


	3. Why Are You Here?

_**Here is chapter three. You may notice that I am kind of sadistic when it comes to my characters. I already know that about myself, obviously. It makes the story more…interesting.**_

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_Immediately after the monsters, die the heroes_

_-Robert Calasso_

"Sword fighting? Why the hell are we doing _sword fighting_?"

"It helps with hand-eye coordination." Oujou rolled her eyes, then gripped the wooden sword and took up a stance. Natsume moved her arms and legs to the correct positions, then took up his stance. They began, with Natsume evading every blow sent at him, then hitting back five times harder then her.

After two hours, Oujou had cuts covering over half of her body and her strength was diminishing rapidly. Natsume made a final slash at her, cutting open her side. Blood spurted out. Oujou cursed. Blood from a slash on her forehead had gotten in her eyes and turned her eyesight red. Now that red was quickly fading to black.

Oujou braced herself against the pain and tried to take up her stance again, but she was too weak. The sword slipped from her bloody hand and she didn't even notice that she was on the ground until she was leaving it.

"What?" Her tongue felt heavy in her mouth. "Training isn't over."

"Yes it is," Natsume's voice was soft, almost gentle.

"Why?" Oujou asked tiredly.

"Because you're going to bleed to death," Natsume slung her arms around his neck and lifted her up. Oujou noticed how strong he was and immediately hated herself for it. Natsume carried her back towards the school, careful not to shake her too much.

"Let me go. Please. I'm fine. Lets continue training." Oujou struggled weakly, still fighting to stay conscious.

"No. You're not fine, idiot." Natsume noticed that Oujou had quieted and her struggles had stopped. He looked down. Oujou was unconscious, her head held up by his arm.

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Oujou knew that this was a dream, but it was different. For the first time in a long time, it was different.

Everyone was dying. Anyone Oujou had ever cared about was dying. Her parents, her sister, Kazu, Yuka, Mikan, and Natsume were all crumpled on the ground, dying. By her power. Because of her curse. They were screaming her name, asking for her help. Begging for her help. But she couldn't help them. "Oujou," they called, "Oujou, help us!" 

"Oujou!" Oujou's eyes flew open. Natsume and Mikan were standing next to her bed. The sun was out and sunlight shone through the curtains.

"I'm glad you're awake!" Mikan exclaimed. Oujou rolled her eyes, then groaned.

"I feel like someone stabbed me over and over and over…"

"Are you alright?" Both Oujou and Mikan looked at Natsume in surprise.

"This isn't your fault." Oujou stated. Natsume opened his mouth to say something, but he didn't get the chance. Everything turned white as the world seemed to blow up. Oujou flew backwards and hit a tree. Blood spurted from her mouth as she sank to the ground, unconscious.

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"Nogi, tell me what the hell is going on with Mikan." Hotaru demanded,

"I don't know." Suddenly there was a loud _**BOOM**_ and they both looked up, alarmed. Hotaru and Ruka raced out of the building and towards the flaming hospital.

"What. The."

"Hell." Hotaru finished. They noticed Natsume and Mikan in a ring of flames and ran over.

"Hyuuga," Hotaru said with aggravating calmness, "Did you set the hospital on fire?"

"No. Do you have any idea where Oujou is?" Natsume asked.

"We haven't seen her." Hotaru pulled out a small device that resembled a PDA. She pressed a few buttons on the screen and then pointed silently to a tree about thirty feet to the right.

Natsume walked over to the tree, picked the person up, and carried her back over. Oujou had red running down her face from her mouth and eyes. She had cried blood.

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"Natsume, what's going on?" Ruka asked impatiently.

"The AAO is invading again and they're after Polka Dots."

"How do you know?"

"Multiple reasons. Look at the hospital explosion. The only people in there were Oujou, Polka Dots, and I. Oujou was in such bad shape that blowing it up didn't help them at all, if they had wanted to take her. Blowing it up didn't affect me, seeing as I could just block the explosion with my fire, so Mi-Polka Dots could be the only one that they were after." Ruka noticed that Natsume had almost accidentally called Mikan by her name, but he decided not to comment on it.

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Oujou sat leaning against the wall, her eyes closed. Her breathing was regular and to some it may seem that she was sleeping.

She wasn't.

A tall boy stood on a windowsill, watching her. He was clad in all black and was almost invisible to the naked eye because of it. His eyes were soft.

"I know that you're there." Oujou said calmly.

"How do-"

"Why are you here?" Oujou interrupted softly.

"You can join us. You can leave here. Please, Kanjouinyuu."

"I can't, Kazu. Yuka made me promise to protect her. To protect Mikan"

The boy's eyes widened. "Yuka…was the lady that always visited you."

"She is Mikan's mother and a prominent person in the AAO." Oujou frowned almost imperceptibly. "Why, Kazu? Why did you get involved?"

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_**If you don't know who Kazu is, read the first chapter of ****Pain of Life**** again. Oh yes, this is purely NatsumeXMikan. Oujou DOES NOT like Natsume like that. I just had to tell you. I'll try to post the next chapter today, but if I can't, I'll try to post it like tomorrow or the next day.**_


	4. Training Again

**Fourth chapter. Like I said at the end of last chapter, Oujou and Natsume don't like each other like that. Please enjoy.**

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"_One way or another you will die. Make sure you live before that time."_

_-Vampire Master_

"_Why Kazu? Why did you get involved?"_

Oujou sat on the floor, her back pressed up against the wall. Her knees were tucked in close and she was hugging them tightly. She was still stuck in the hospital and they didn't even seem to consider letting her out.

I need to leave. What if more of the AAO comes? Hyuuga can't protect Mikan by himself. What if she gets taken?

The door opened. Natsume and Mikan walked in. Mikan was grinning at Oujou, but Natsume had on his normal, emotionless expression.

"What are you two doing here?" Oujou asked tonelessly. Natsume looked over at her.

"When was the last time you slept?" He asked, his voice matching hers.

"Two days ago. Why?"

"You should sleep so they'll let you out."

"Let's train." Oujou said calmly.

"No," Natsume's voice hardened slightly.

"If you don't train me, I'll train myself." Oujou stood up, wobbled slightly, then walked towards the door. Natsume stood in her way and when she tried to walk past him, he grabbed her wrist.

"You aren't going anywhere." He stated. He shoved her towards her bed and she stumbled backwards, then fell on the bed with a thump. Oujou tried to stand up, but was too weak and thus couldn't.

"I'll train you after you rest. Until then, you're stuck here." Natsume grabbed Mikan's wrist and pulled her out of the room. Oujou sighed, then sank back into the bed and fell asleep.

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"You've failed three times to capture Sakura Mikan." A male voice stated. "If this continues, I will have to call in someone else."

"NO-I mean, I'll complete this mission, sir. You can count on me."

"Good."

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"I'll train you again under one condition: if you get too badly hurt, I'm stopping the training until you recover. You really haven't recovered enough yet, but Persona insisted." Natsume looked annoyed at the idea.

"Okay. What is it this time?" Oujou asked. Her voice was shaky and she coughed up blood more frequently now than ever, although she never let anybody know. Her body was getting a lot weaker, partly due to her limitless alice type.

"We're returning to normal hand-to-hand combat. Get ready. And we're only doing this for an hour at most." Natsume blinked. "Begin."

Oujou attacked Natsume and he hit back, but she noticed that his blows were significantly weaker than usual. He also seemed more careful, more contained.

"Don't hold back," she called, "It doesn't help me train." Natsume looked surprised for a second, but his expression returned to his normal, stoic expression. His blows gained a little more conviction, but they were nowhere near his usual caliber.

With that said, he still beat her within half an hour. Oujou was left lying on the ground, her eyes partially closed and blood streaming out of her mouth. Natsume crouched down next to her.

"This is why I didn't want to train you until you had recovered. You need to go back to the infirmary and rest."

"No," Oujou murmured, "There's no point. I need to protect Mikan. If she gets admitted into the infirmary, it'll be easier to protect her. That was, she can't run around so much…" Oujou trailed off, her eyes closed.

"You still need to rest. What if the person after Mikan attacks you?"

There was a pause. "He won't."

_He won't hurt me._

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**I hope you liked it. This is my fourth chapter posted today. Thank you for reading. I'll post again soon. Please review. Oh yeah, you won't find "Vampire Master" anywhere. I am in the middle of writing it. It isn't a fanfic. This was kind of a pointless chapter, but I enjoyed writing it.**

_**I want GUM!!!!!!!!**_


	5. Playing with Fire and Taunting Death

_**Hope you like it. I worked for a while on this. I am almost completely changing things. Oh well, you didn't know what was going to happen anyway. Whoever "you" are. Well, please enjoy.**_

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_Protect those you wish to protect, but do not ignore those you do not._

The door to the classroom swung open. Oujou walked in, her face emotionless. Everyone looked up, startled at her actually being there.

"Hyuuga, Persona needs you." Natsume stiffened, then got up and walked with Oujou out of the room.

"Where?" He asked.

"In a minute. First, I need to talk to you. We should tell the class about the invasion. I know that Nogi knows, but it would help a lot to let people know."

Natsume raised an eyebrow. "Even Polka Dots?"

"No. And we can't tell them now anyway."

"Why not?"

"Persona. We have a mission together tonight."

Natsume cursed. "You're kidding me. He's just messing with us."

"We need to go to the headmaster's office. C'mon," Oujou and Natsume walked to the headmaster's office. Oujou knocked and the door opened. They walked in.

"Your mission is to escort the headmaster to the AAO headquarters and protect him for the duration of the visit." Oujou could tell that Persona was happy and it scared her.

"What the hell are you _doing_?! We need to stay here and protect Mikan!" Instead of responding, the headmaster stood up and walked over to Oujou. He unfastened her alice-limiter earrings. Oujou screamed and fell onto Natsume. Her head was flooded with the emotion of every person in the school.

The young headmaster lifted Oujou off of Natsume and fastened her earrings back on her. Oujou stopped shaking and she flushed bright red.

"Don't _do _that," she gasped.

"I could leave these off. I could have an amplifying alice stone embedded in your skin. You could feel every emotion within five miles. Would you like that?"

Oujou shook her head. "But why are you visiting the AAO, especially now?" She asked.

"We're making a deal. We will suspend all missions for a month if they call off the invasion."

Oujou opened her mouth to respond, but Persona cut in. "Be ready by six p.m. You are excused from class for the rest of the day. Review the layout of the headquarters together." Persona handed a package of papers to Natsume. Natsume and Oujou vacated the room.

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Here's the deal: you stay in the shadows. I'll be the quote-on-quote bodyguard and prevent any frontal attacks. You take out any snipers or long range alice users."

"This isn't going to work." Oujou announced.

"Do you think that I don't know that? But still, we have no choice. I'll tell Ruka to protect Mikan. He'll be glad to."

"I _know_ that. That wasn't what I meant. This isn't going to _work_." Oujou walked out of the room. She was frowning slightly.

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"Do you think this wise?"

"We need to get her out of here."

"Even at the risk of bringing her to the AAO?"

"I can protect her to a certain extent."

"You know who she is. If they get her, there'll be hell to pay."

"I know that. I really wonder how she managed to stay free for so long."

"She must have had a hell of a lot of luck."

"Lets hope that luck doesn't run out."

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"With the headmaster gone, now will be a perfect chance to get her."

"What if he brings her here?"

"The we'll keep her here. But he probably wouldn't be that stupid."

"So that kid still hasn't succeeded?"

"No."

"It's just as well."

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_**Ooh, cliffhanger. I'll try to post the next chapter by tomorrow. Please review.**_


	6. To Leave the Darkness

_**I like this chapter. I hope that you do too. It was…interesting to write. READ IT!!!!!**_

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_All humans should try and learn before they die what they are running from, and to, and why._

_-James Thurber_

"It takes five hours to get to the AAO headquarters. During that time you will explain your plan to me." The headmaster climbed into the limo and Oujou and Natsume followed. They sat next to each other, facing the headmaster.

Natsume spoke. "I will be your conventional bodyguard and protect you from frontal attacks. Oujou will stay behind and protect you from any snipers. We have both memorized the building's layout and know the most efficient entrance and escape routes."

"I have one change to your plan. You will both be my-as you say-'conventional bodyguards'. That way, it is harder for either of you to…wander off."

"I wouldn't advise that." Natsume said.

"I know that you wish to protect her from harm, but this is for the best." The headmaster said politely.

"Very well, sir," Oujou said just as politely as the headmaster. "I have a question."

"Yes?"

"How old are you?"

"I'm sixteen."

"Thank you, sir."

"Oujou started coughing violently. Warm liquid splattered the hand covering her mouth and when she pulled it away, it was covered in blood. Oujou muttered something, then returned to staring at the headmaster.

"Relax," the headmaster said soothingly, "You don't need to force yourself right now." Oujou continued to stare at the headmaster, not even seeming to hear his words. The headmaster leaned forward and whispered in Oujou's ear, "You are allowed to relax. I'm not just going to drop dead." His breath tickled her ear. Oujou didn't move.

"Fine. I'll return this later." The headmaster sat back in his seat. Oujou's eyes flickered open and closed as she struggled to stay conscious. Then she sank back in her seat, her eyes closed.

"What did you do to her?" Natsume demanded.

"She just fell asleep. She looks so…innocent when she sleeps. You can rest too. It's going to be a long journey."

"If you give me the same choice that you gave her, I'll rest." Natsume leaned his head against the window and closed his eyes. He remained tense and gave no illusion of resting.

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"I hate it when people do that." Oujou muttered. Her head felt like someone had dropped a ton of bricks on it.

"I see that you're awake. How are you doing?" The headmaster smiled gently at her.

"I feel like crap. Can you _never_ do that again?" Oujou rubbed her head, then glanced over at Natsume. He was fast asleep; his head leaned against the window.

"I apologize. We will arrive in two hours. You could rest more."

"I'd prefer not to."

"Fair enough,"

"Why did you knock me out? _How_ did you knock me out?"

"It is unhealthy not to rest every once in a while. It can hurt your developmental growth. And as for how, well, it's a secret." He smiled.

Oujou rolled her eyes. She rubbed her throat and groaned. Her throat was raw and scratchy. She coughed and blood yet again spurted out. Oujou broke into a coughing fit. Natsume woke up and looked over at her.

"Are you alright?" He asked softly.

"Do I _look_ alright to you?" She snapped. Her eyes softened. "Sorry. I'm fine. I-" She broke off into another coughing fit. She put her head down and closed her eyes, trying to focus on someone else's emotions. Oujou found that focusing on another's emotions helped take the pain away.

Oujou was surprised to find that she couldn't fell the headmaster's emotions. They seemed blocked, faint, almost non-existent. Oujou knew that that was impossible, but it seemed to be happening.

_What's going on?_

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_**I hope that you liked it. It had a lot of dialogue. If you can guess the headmaster's Alice, I'll give you a virtual prize. YAY!!! Please review.**_


	7. Light Revealing the Darkness

_**Hi!! Sorry I took so long. I was busy working on something else. Plus, I wasn't allowed on the computer yesterday. Anyway, this was interesting to write. I already had parts of it planned out for a while.**_

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_As shadows encroach on the light, fear grows in the heart of men and women all around the world._

"We've arrived," the driver called from the front. Oujou sighed and straightened out. She noticed something reflective on the headmaster's neck and grimaced. The car came to a stop and the three got out. Oujou pulled the principal to the side. She pulled a small plastic object off of his neck.

"You shouldn't wear this. It is easier to tell if there is an internal attack if I can feel your emotions. Using this to mask them just hurts you."

"Then I suppose I should take this off." The headmaster reached over and pulled a similar-looking object off of Oujou's ear. "Holding back your emotions hurts you."

Oujou snatched the object back and stuffed it in her pocket. "Emotions are hazardous in a fight." The headmaster sighed and walked back to join Natsume. Oujou followed, but not before she stuck the object back onto her ear.

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"Welcome to our abode," A tall man lounged in a chair, surveying the group from behind thin glasses. "We hope to have a fruitful discussion with you in the upcoming days."

"Thank you," the headmaster replied.

"Well, Satsuto-san, shall we begin now?" The man asked politely.

"Very well," Headmaster Satsuto replied.

"You may only take one of your bodyguards in. The other may stay outside the door."

"I'll go," Natsume offered before anyone else could say anything. With that, the three proceeded into the room and the door closed.

"You need to get out of here," Oujou spun around. Yuka was standing in front of her (Behind her?). "And when you return to the Academy, wear your mask at all times. That way, they won't be able to tell who you are."

"Yuka-san," Oujou began.

"I know that this is more or less treason to the AAO, but you must stay free." Before Oujou could say anything, Yuka vanished. Oujou struggled to maintain her composure. She was confused and everybody being cryptic wasn't helping.

Nobody will tell me what the hell is going on. And something's wrong. There's no way that they would give me a mission and then force me away partway through. What are they doing?

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"I'll take the first watch," Natsume said to Oujou as they sat in the room that had been _generously_ provided by the AAO. "Then I'll wake you up at about three for your watch."

"I'll take both watches. I wouldn't sleep anyway."

"You need your rest; you are human, just like the rest of us."

Oujou made a face. "You sound like the headmaster. And remember what I told you: I don't sleep unless necessary."

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_**Flashback**_

_Oujou removed her hands, tears running down her face._

"_Get away from her, bastard!" Natsume screamed from behind her. A wall of fire appeared around Oujou and almost immediately went out. Natsume fell to the ground, panting and sweating._

"_Go to hell." Natsume muttered._

"_I've already been there."_

_"I'm in hell every moment I sleep. I have had the same nightmare every night since I killed my parents. I see myself killing my parents and I can't stop myself, can't control myself. I don't sleep for days at a time, just to avoid the nightmare. I've already been to hell and back."_

**_End of Flashback_**

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"Very well, but if we stay here tomorrow, you aren't doing this," Oujou left the room and went to stand outside of Headmaster Satsuto's room. His room was next to theirs. Oujou sat on the floor, her back pressed up against the wall.

"Hello, Shiro Kochou."

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_**Mwahahahahahahaha!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!1 Sorry, I couldn't resist. I hope you liked it. You'll see who it is. YAY ME!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!**_

_**If you don't review,**_

_**A cow will come**_

_**And sit on you…**_


	8. Author's Note

Sorry 'bout this, but I can't post until January 2nd. I left part of the next chapter at school. Well, most of it, actually. Anyway, by the third, I'll have posted the next three chapters. Until then, bear with me.


	9. Uncovering and Erasing

_**Well, Hiya folks. A missed all y'all. Sorry…heh heh…**_

_**Well, the bunny says hi.**_

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_What are you thinking of, alone?_

_What burden are you bearing, alone?_

_A little bit will do_

_Share the heavy burden on your shoulders_

_With me_

_I will do anything I can,_

_As long as I can do it…_

_-Gakuen Alice Chapter 30_

"Hello, Shiro Kochou."

Oujou's eyes widened and she stood up. Reo was standing twenty feet in front of her, smiling. He walked over and crouched down so his eyes were level with hers.

"Oyasumi nasai," Reo's voice was soft and melodic and she felt her body trying to obey. Oujou backed up against the wall.

"Shut up," she muttered. _Crap. I need to stay here to protect the headmaster. I guess that this is the downside to getting so little rest: I can't fight his or even use my alice effectively. I might end up losing control and killing the headmaster or Natsume. Or this entire facility._

"Sleep, Shiro Kochou," Oujou slumped against the wall, too tired to stay upright. The door next to her opened and the headmaster stepped out.

In a strong, clear voice that freakishly resembled Reo's, he said, "Reo, stop that. Leave now\." Oujou's mind was overloaded by the voice and she passed out.

As Reo walked away looking slightly dazed, the headmaster lifted Oujou up. Natsume walked out of the room.

"He wasn't after you, was he?" Natsume asked the headmaster.

"What are you implying?"

"Why do they want her? And don't try to deny it: I know that they are after her," the headmaster didn't respond; he carried Oujou into his room and set her down on his bed. Natsume followed, closing the door behind them.

"They're after her alices," The headmaster said. He pulled a blanket over Oujou, then turned to face Natsume. Headmaster Satsuto sat down on the corner of the bed, motioning for Natsume to sit on a chair.

"Than why the hell did you bring her here?" Natsume shouted.

"I can protect her better here, where I have direct contact with her almost constantly." Headmaster Satsuto glanced at Oujou, his eyes softening.

"What the hell do you think I was doing back at the Academy?"

"You're in love with her, aren't you?" The headmaster asked tiredly. He seemed to have aged ten years in the few minutes that they had been talking.

Natsume calmed down significantly. "Of course not. I'm just trying to protect her…from becoming like me. Now I'm going to go keep guard." Natsume stood up and walked to the door. He went outside and slammed the door shut.

The headmaster turned around and looked at Oujou. She was sitting up and had thrown her blanket off. Oujou stood up.

"I'm going to go guard. I've been sleeping too much recently," she announced without looking at Headmaster Satsuto.

"Stay here. You've only slept what, like fifteen hours in the past week. Anyway, Hyuuga's guarding." Oujou ignored him and started walking to the door. "_Stay_" Oujou, overwhelmed by his voice, fell over. The geadmaster caught her and helped her right herself.

Oujou pulled away sharply. "Headmaster Satsuto, _what the hell do you want with me_?"

"I'm afraid I don't understand."

"Why would you bring me, a girl who's been at the academy for a little over a month, to be your bodyguard? There are so many better people to protect you._Why are you protecting me_?"

The headmaster stammered something inaudible. Oujou rolled her eyes. "You have a crush on my, don't you?" She remarked dryly.

Headmaster Satsuto blushed bright red. He reached over and pulled the plastic object off her ear again (A/N Previous Chapter). Oujou gasped. She raised her hand and it looked like she was about to hit him. Her hand finally fell, trembling.

"I was right: the emotion repressor also represses fatigue. Now you should go rest. I'm not giving this back." Oujou walked out of the room and to her room next door. She sat on the floor, her back against the cold wall. And she waited.

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There was a loud noise from the room the Natsume and Oujou shared. Natsume raced in.

_Crap._

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_**Yay! A cliffhanger. I'll try to post again soon. Sorry that took so long, but I was on break and the last half of the story was at school. Oh yeah, the quote is only part of the quote. If you look at the chapter, you'll see why I don't use the entire quote.**_

_**Review or the evil pink bunny of doom will eat you. Not two, not four, three.**_

_**PS. I don't have a bunny.**_

_**PPS. Review anyway.**_


	10. Came and Went

_**Sorry I took so long. I was kinda stuck and busy and stuff. Oh well, here it is. Enjoy.**_

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_They that have power to hurt, and will do none,  
That do not do the thing, they most do show,  
Who moving others, are themselves as stone,  
Unmoved, cold, and to temptation slow:_

_-Shakespeare Sonnet XCIV _

"What the hell were you thinking, shooting her?"

"Well, I thought that she's be too dangerous awake."

"We were told distinctly not to shoot her. She's more valuable than us. If she dies, we die too."

These voices heralded Oujou's reentering of the world of the awake. Oujou opened her eyes and groaned. Her entire body was a mass of pain centered on a spot about four inches below her heart.

The two men rushed over to her. Oujou struggled to sit up, but failed, her entire body on fire. The door swung open and Oujou closed her eyes, relaxing as much as possible.

"Has she awakened yet?" A new male voice asked.

"She was awake just a second ago, but I guess she fell back asleep."

"Why did you shoot her? I believe that my orders were to not shoot her."

"I-I'm sorry, sir. I thought it would be safer."

"You have one more chance, Yamamoto. You and Inoue are to protect and guard Oujou Kanjouinyuu. If you fail, you will both die. Do you understand?"

"Yes sir," both men chorused. The door swung shut. Oujou peeked a glance. The third man had left. Oujou sighed and went back to sleep.

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"We need to get Oujou-san back," the headmaster told Natsume.

"I know that. You stay here, lock the windows and door, and if someone comes, hide or run, or do whatever. I'll go after her." Natsume frowned when the headmaster shook his head.

"I'm going too. I can be of some use." He pulled up his shirt a little to show Natsume a small black gun attached to his belt.

"What's your alice?" Natsume asked as he checked the chambers in his own gun to make sure it was full. He would rather use the gun than his alice, but if it were empty, it would do no good.

The headmaster hesitated for a moment, and then answered, "I can take the alice of anyone around me and use it as my own. It doesn't put extra strain on a person with the limitless alice type's body." Natsume nodded, frowning.

"Do you have any training in martial arts or any type of fighting?" The headmaster nodded.

"I have trained with Persona for almost my entire life. I'm not as good as you, but I'm not horrible." Natsume, having finished his examination of his gun, checked every one of his throwing knives before strapping a kunai to his back. The headmaster wondered briefly where Natsume had taken that out of, but he decided not to dwell too long on it. "I can track where she is: I just need to concentrate for a minute."

After a moment, he opened his eyes. "I found her. She's underground. We need to leave the building and reenter to reach her." The two of them jumped out of the window and landed on the nearest tree branch, then took off to find Oujou.

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_There shouldn't be any more sacrifices. I should be the only sacrifice. Because I sinned. But they're going to try to save me anyway. And I can't stop them. I can't escape, either. My energy is so depleted that I'd just collapse or die trying to escape._

"Can I have some water?" Oujou's guards looked over at her. One nodded and left the room, returning a moment later with a glass of water. Oujou took it and sipped it slowly, the water soothing her sore throat.

"How long have I been here?" Oujou asked carefully. She knew that if she asked too many questions, they wouldn't answer anything.

"Prisoners aren't allowed to ask questions," one of the men snapped. _Oh well, it was worth a try. And I can't even use my alice now. I'm too weak from the bullet wound._

"Intruders in the building." A cold voice crackled out of the men's radios. "Protect the prisoner. Maximum security formation."

_They're here._

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_**Please review. I'll try to post again soon, but no promises. I'm have things like HW and midterms coming up and stuff. Sorry if I take a while.**  
_


	11. Leaving, Returning

_**Um…heh heh…sorry that took so long. I was stucky. Yes, that is a word. I just had writer's block, but now I'm unstucky.**_

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_Learn from yesterday, live for today, hope for tomorrow. The important thing is not to stop questioning._

_-Albert Einstein_

Oujou shielded her eyes as the door blew up. Both men in charge of guarding her collapsed and Natsume and Headmaster Satsuto rushed in. The headmaster ran over to Oujou and helped her out of bed.

"Are you alright?" Headmaster Satsuto asked worriedly.

"I'm fine. Give me the emotion suppresser." The headmaster fumbled in his pocket for a second, trying to find it.

"We need to go," Natsume ordered.

"Do you _want_ me to collapse? I need it to suppress my fatigue." Headmaster Satsuto handed the small plastic object to Oujou as she pressed it onto her ear hastily.

"Come on," Natsume said impatiently. Oujou nodded and the three of them ran out of the room. Oujou stopped suddenly, doubling over.

Headmaster Satsuto stopped as well and placed a hand on her back. "What's wrong?" Oujou semi-straightened out and shook her head, her face tight with pain. She began running after Natsume again and the headmaster followed.

"Where are we exactly?" Oujou asked the headmaster as they ran.

"We're underground in a connected part of the building, but we can't easily get to the main part from here," he replied, "We can leave the same way we got in, hopefully, and then we can get to the car and leave. Oujou nodded and the three continued running in silence.

A voice sounded from behind them. "What do you think you're doing?" The voice was Reo's.

Headmaster Satsuto stopped and turned around calmly. Natsume and followed suit hesitantly. "We're leaving, Reo. You aren't going to stop us."

Reo laughed. "You're pheromone alice won't work on me. I drank the anti-pheromone potion that your school so cleverly created."

"If you use, it, you should also know that it is useless if I take off my control device." The headmaster pulled a black stud earring off of his ear and shouted. "LEAVE, REO!" Reo stumbled back a step, then collapsed on the floor. Headmaster Satsuto turned around. "Sorry about that. That was the only way to stop him."

Oujou and Natsume nodded stiffly and the three of them continued running. The alarm was still going and the flashing lights were giving Oujou a headache. Finally they reached stairs and they all climbed up, Headmaster Satsuto first and Natsume last. When they reached the top of the stair and climbed out of the window to the outside, the three of them saw four AAO members running up the stairs.

Picking up the pace, Oujou, Natsume, and Headmaster Satsuto ran to the car and pulled open the doors. As soon as the three of them were in the car and the driver had started driving, Oujou slumped back in her seat, her face pale and sweating.

"Are you sure you're alright?" Headmaster Satsuto asked.

"I'm fine." Oujou rested her head against the window and sighed. In the passing light of a streetlight, Headmaster Satsuto saw a dark patch on Oujou's shirt.

"You're bleeding." Oujou glanced down at her shirt, closed her eyes, and put her head back on the cold glass.

"That's what happens when you get shot." Oujou winced as she shifted her position slightly. Her hair fell in front of her face, but in the light of another streetlight, Headmaster Satsuto could see the gleam of a tear running down her cheek.

"Why did you save me?" She screamed angrily. Oujou launched herself at the headmaster, but she never reached him. She collapsed and her head fell forward into his lap. "Why the hell did you save me?"

"We need you to be safe," the headmaster replied evenly.

"What if I don't want to be safe?"

_What if I want to die?_

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_**Ok, that was a little weird. Sorry about that. Heh heh… ANYway, I'll try to post again soon. Now I actually know what's going to happen next.**_

_**REVIEW TIME!**_


	12. War Time

_**Well, that took longer than I had hoped. Sorry 'bout that. Anyway, hope you enjoy.**_

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_It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair..._

_A Tale of Two Cities__ by __Charles Dickens_

Oujou opened her eyes a little and blinked. A bare white ceiling loomed up in front of her, the image wavering in her eyes, then steadying in her view. Turning her head to the side with difficulty, Oujou saw the headmaster sleeping in a chair next to her bed. Flitting her gaze upward a little, she saw Kazu standing in the windowsill, staring at her.

Oujou moved head back so it was centered on her pillow. "Kazu," she whispered. The headmaster's eyes flitted open and he looked over at her. "Kazu," Oujou felt her body slump back against the bed and was asleep within seconds.

Kazu was gone.

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"She's in no condition to fight, but if she's just left alone here, she'll be taken. And if she's taken, we probably won't be able to get her back. I don't care how good the rescue of you went; that was just dumb luck." The voice swam drunkenly into Oujou's mind before fading away.

"If you're going to put anyone here, put Andou. I don't like him, but he's pretty good." That was Natsume's voice. _What is he doing here?_

"Hyuuga," Oujou rasped. Prying her eyes open, she saw Natsume and Headmaster Satsuto standing next to her bed. Oujou sat up and propped herself up against the wall. "I don't need anyone to protect me. I can fight."

The headmaster opened his mouth to say something but, before he could, the door swung open. A boy in a high school uniform walked in. "Hyuuga Natsume and Oujou Kanjouinyuu are to report to the Dangerous Ability room immediately," he announced before leaving.

Natsume walked out of the room as Oujou climbed out of bed. She was wearing a dark gray shirt and matching pants. The headmaster placed a hand on her shoulder. "You don't have to do this. I can get you an exemption from class for a while."

"I'm going to class and you can't stop me." Oujou pulled the headmaster's hand off of her and limped out of the room. Natsume was waiting for them and together they walked to the classroom.

"You've become too protective of me, Hyuuga," Oujou remarked lightly and they walked down the deserted hallway. "You can't stop me from becoming like you. Hyuuga, you of all people should know, sometimes people are just too far gone." Oujou stopped and pulled the door to the Dangerous Ability room open. They entered together.

"Good. Now everyone's here." Oujou barely glanced at Persona as she took a seat. "The AAO will be here inside an hour. All students are currently being moved to their central underground safe houses, divided up by grade. Kuro Neko and Shiro Kochou are to guard Priority One. Ibaragi is to guard Priority Two. Andou is to guard Priority Three. The rest of you are to guard your separate grades. Go." The class dispersed.

"Hyuuga, who's 'Priority One'?" Natsume glanced at Oujou before slipping his mask on and Oujou immediately knew the answer. "It's Mikan, isn't it? I hate that bastard."

"So do I."

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"Why do they care?" Oujou remembered asking that a long time ago, too long ago to matter when. It was after she had stopped being human but before she had died. But no one had answered and now she was dead. She was dead and it didn't matter anymore. Oujou didn't know when she had died, or how. All that mattered was that she was dead.

But why _do_ they care about others? Why did she care? Or more importantly, why did she fight? Why did she fight for those she cared about? And did it change anything.

"There's no point in worrying about it now." Oujou looked up, started.

"You…too…" Natsume nodded, even though it hadn't been a question.

"We all think about it at some time. And we all get over it. You will too. It doesn't matter if you want to fight. They'll make you anyway. They'll find some way to make you. Even you."

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"Yuka-dono, what are you doing here?" Kazu stood up quickly when Yuka walked into the room. He had been instructed to pull out of Gakuen Alice and was now staying in a nearby hotel.

"I've been instructed to tell you that you will be participating in the invasion." She pulled a gun out of her pocket and handed it to him. "I have been…told to give this to you. I don't care what they tell you, you are not to shoot Oujou Kanjouinyuu or Sakura Mikan. Do you understand?"

"I understand. Don't worry, I won't. Thank you, Yuka-dono."

_I could never hurt Kanjouinyuu._

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_**Hi again. I haven't talked to you since…the beginning of the chapter. Well, I hope you enjoyed it. The invasion is coming next. That should take a while. So, review please.**_


	13. Special Chapter 1: Death

_**Um…this is really emo and stuff so if you don't want to read it, you don't have to. I'll post the next plot-related chapter by tomorrow, hopefully. Anyway, enjoy.**_

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–Submitted to Consideration Weekly via email by Oujou Kanjouinyuu.

"_Death"_

_What is death? That is a question that many have asked and none have truly answered. In my belief, there three stages of death. The first is when the mind dies. Some minds die due to Alzheimer's or head trauma. Others die from a traumatic incident they have witnessed or experienced that drives them insane or depresses them. The second part of death is when the body dies. That can be from murder, suicide, or natural causes. The last from of death is when all memories of a person are gone. When every person who has ever known you or heard of you is gone, you are truly dead._

_I am the perfect example of the first part of death. I died sometime after I killed my parents. People would consider me neither responsible nor related to how they died, but I believe I am. I did not die immediately after their death, but I died soon after. My body is still alive, but my mind, my soul, is dead._

_When your mind is dead in the way that mine is, you see the world differently. You lose the ability to see the good of the world. Sunlight becomes too bright, laughter becomes too loud, and happiness becomes too…happy. Sometimes when your mind dies, you don't want to go back to how you were before. It feels wrong and exposed. If you begin to laugh again, it hurts. Why should you be allowed to laugh? What did you do to deserve to be allowed to laugh? Also, showing your emotions is like opening yourself up to be hurt again. Why let yourself risk getting hurt again when you can stay impervious to the pain? That is what some people think. The answer is that being cold and hard hurts. It hurts just as much as you could be hurt if you open yourself up to the world._

_When you die, why do people decorate your casket and dress you in nice clothes and make you look neat and clean? Is it for your sake? Or is it for theirs? Doing that makes people feel better about death and not fear it as much. If it seems like death is neat and clean, what is there to fear. That is also where the idea of heaven comes from. If you are going to go to a happy, perfect place when you die, there is no reason to fear death. Personally, I dislike the idea of heaven. For one thing, I don't want to basically live eternally. Also, when I'm in heaven, will I have all of my memories of my life? If I won't, I will spend eternity trying to remember everything that I did and making up horrible things that I could have done. If I will, I will remember every bad thing, everything I did wrong, in my life. That would be torture. Instead, it would be better to just die in peace and never have to think again._

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_"__死__"_

_死は何であるか。それは多数が尋ね、どれも偽りなく答えなかった質問である。私の確信では、そこに死の__3__つの段階。第__1__心が死ぬときである。ある心は__Alzheimer__かヘッド外傷のために死ぬ。他はまたは経験されてことドライブ異常なそれら目撃するか、またはそれらを弱める外傷性の事件がもとで死ぬ。死の第__2__部分はボディが死ぬときである。それは殺害、自殺、または自然な原因からある場合もある。死のからの最後は人の記憶すべてが行くときである。知っている か、または聞いたあることがあらゆる人が行くとき、死んでいる偽りなく。_

_私は死の最初の部分の完全な例である。私は私が私の親を殺した後いつか死んだ。人々は私がそうであることを責任がある関係したいかにに死んだが、私は信じ るか私を考慮しない。私は死の直後に死ななかったが、すぐに後死んだ。私のボディはまだ生きているが、私の心、私の精神は、死んでいる。_

_鉱山はあることあなたの心が方法で死んでいるとき、世界を別様に見る。世界のよいの見る機能を失う。日光は余りに明るくなる、笑い声は余りに騒々しくな り、幸福は__幸せに余りになる。時々あなたの心が死ぬとき行きいかにに前にあったか、たいと思わない。それは悪事を感じ、露出した。再度笑い始めればそれは傷つく。な ぜ笑うことは許されるべきであるか。何に割り当てられるように値するために笑うためにしたか。また、あなたの感情を示すことは開始あなた自身のようまで再 度傷つくである。苦痛に不浸透にとどまることができるときなぜあなた自身を傷を再度得ることを危険にさらすことを許可しなさいか。それは何人かの人々考え るものである。答えは冷たく、堅い傷であることである。それは世界まであなた自身を開ければ傷つけることができるとちょうど多くを傷つける。_

_いつ、人々はなぜ飾り、あなたの小箱を服を着せ、素晴らしい衣服のそしてさせる一見を端正く及びきれいく死ぬか。それはあなたの為のためであるか。または それは彼等の物のためであるか。その作りをして人々は死についてよりよくそれをその位恐れないために感じ。それが死のように端正及びようである恐れること をそこにある何が、きれいにしなさい。それは天の考えが来るところからまたである。死ぬとき幸せで、完全な場所に行こうとすれば、死を恐れる理由がない。 個人的に、私は天の考えを嫌っている。__1__つの事のために、私は基本に永遠に住みたいと思わない。また私が天にいるとき、私に私の生命の私の記憶のすべてがあるか。、私は私が試み、した私がしたか もしれない恐ろしい事の上で使うすべてを覚えることを作る永遠を。私が意志、私あらゆる悪い事を覚えれば、私が傷つけた私の生命のすべて。それは苦悶であ る。その代り、ちょうど平和で死ぬことはよくなく、決して再度考える必要がないために。_

–Submission: denied

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_**One thing: you cannot tell me that an almost thirteen-year-old (like Oujou) would never write this. Oujou is older than me by about a month. **_


	14. Beginning of the Invasion

_**Hello again. Here I am. Again. Well, here it is. I just typed almost all of this today. I really hope you like it. I do.**_

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_Two people want to protect her_

_For two different reasons._

_One does it for love_

_And to heal his own soul. _

_The other does it because of a promise_

_And to show herself she is human._

_Failure here would mean death._

_For both the body_

_And the soul._

"Polkadots, come on. We need to go." Oujou watched as Natsume attempted to pull Mikan away from the crowd of friends, a ghost of a smile on her lips. Someone tapped her on the shoulder and she turned around.

"What's going on?" Oujou frowned at Hotaru's demand, then opened her mouth to tell her that it wasn't her business. "You _are_ going to tell me."

"I don't have time for this, Imai. All I can tell you is that the AAO is coming." Hotaru's eyes widened a little as her stoic composure slipped for a second.

"Why are you taking Mikan?" Oujou rolled her eyes.

"Imai, you're supposed to be the genius. And I can't take you too. We need to protect her and we're going to have a hell of a time doing that without having to protect you too."

Hotaru nodded. "Go. She needs it a lot more than any of us do." Oujou nodded and started to walk out of the room with Natsume, who had finally convinced Mikan to follow him.

Suddenly, the lights went out, plunging the room into complete darkness. There was a small shriek and a few loud groans that echoed around the room. A small flame appeared above Natsume's hand and illuminated the room, throwing everything into high relief.

"Oi, Polkadots. Stop clinging to me. We need to get out of here." There was a series of loud gunshots from overhead and some of their classmates screamed.

"Hell," Oujou muttered. She grabbed Natsume's wrist and pulled him out of the room. Natsume pulled Mikan with him and together the three of them raced out of the building. The outside was nightmarish: dark and fiery. Most of the campus was on fire and it lit up the night like they were in Hell itself. Natsume cursed and turned to Natsume.

"Hyuuga, take her to the DA room. I'm going to stay here and guard our grade." Natsume shook his head and grabbed her wrist, pulling both her and Mikan towards the middle school building where the DA room was located. Bullets whizzed overhead and one struck Oujou in the shoulder. Cursing vividly, she clutched her shoulder in an attempt to stop the flow of blood.

When they reached the DA room, Natsume released Oujou's wrist and she fell into a nearby chair, panting. Natsume saw the wound in her shoulder and cursed as vividly as she had. Oujou groaned and ripped off her left sleeve and tore it into strips, wrapping it tightly around her bleeding shoulder.

"Natsume, what're we doing here?" Oujou clenched her teeth as Natsume turned to Mikan.

"It doesn't matter."

"But Natsume," she whined.

"Shut up," Oujou ordered harshly, "I don't have the time or the energy to deal with you right now. You are going to shut up voluntarily or I will _shut you up myself._" Finished talking, Oujou sank back against the cold back of the chair, panting.

"Hyuuga, how long can they hold them off? 'Cause our class alone can't drive them back." Natsume glanced at Oujou before sitting down next to Mikan.

"They called for reinforcements from the U.S. and Britain branches."

Oujou groaned. "They're going to take forever to get here. I guess we're on our own." Standing up, she walked to the window and peered out. She ducked seconds before a bullet shot through the window, shattering it. The bullet embedded itself into the opposite wall with a loud thunk. Natsume swore and pulled Mikan back down into the chair she had just vacated.

"Polkadots, get under the table," Natsume ordered through clenched teeth. Mikan nodded and followed obediently. Oujou crawled over to Natsume on her hands and knees.

"God, Hyuuga. You must go through this hell all the time. I feel sorry for you." Oujou fiddled with her earring, obviously agitated.

"Now is not the time to be sentimental," Natsume hissed.

"Hyuuga, take her and get out of here. If there's anyone directly below here or within…I don't know, twenty feet from the building that is from the school, get them as far away from here and possible. And if you can, put a ring of fire to keep them close to the building. If you can't don't kill yourself trying." Natsume hesitated and Oujou clamed Mikan's hand onto his wrist and shoved. The two of them stumbled forward a few steps, then turned around.

"Go. I'll give you ten minutes, but if you take longer than that, you will die along with the AAO members." Natsume nodded and pulled Mikan out of the room, shutting the door behind them. Oujou sat down and sensed their retreat. Being an empath sucked, but it could also help in something like this.

Oujou checked her watch again—like she didn't already know the time—and groaned. She still had a minute left. Closing her eyes, she could feel fear all around her. One person seemed to be coming closer. And he-she wasn't afraid, but worried.

Hands grabbed her shoulders.

"Shit, Kazu. Get out of here. I don't want to kill you, but if you don't get out of here, I'm going to have to. I need to activate my alice now or we're going to lose the academy." The hands tried to help her up, but she shoved away. "Christ, Kazu. You need to get out of here."

Oujou's power flared and she let out a strangled cry. Kazu collapsed on top of her and she hugged him close, pulling him down with her. Oujou formed a sort of protective bubble around him and let her power widen out, enveloping as much of the academy as she dare. She knew that Natsume had listened—she had felt him and Mikan go into the Northern Forest. Without her control device on, she could sense everyone's emotion on the entire campus and their locations. It hurt like hell, but it was great for something like this.

Oujou felt herself weakening, but she pushed on. If she stopped now, she would collapse and not be able to help for too long. Now at least she could wipe quite a few out before she fainted. All Oujou hoped was that Yuka-san wasn't in this first wave. She couldn't sense her, but discriminating specific people that she didn't know very well was hard.

Black. Falling. Hitting.

Fear.

Pain.

Terror.

Repulsion.

_Hope._

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_**Ok. I really hope you enjoyed it. I'll post again soon. I promise. In the mean time, please review. Please.**_


	15. All Alone

_**Hi again. Sorry that took so long. I typed all of this today. Anyway, the Invasion is about halfway done. After that, I'll ask you if you want me to continue. If you do, I will. If nobody asks me to continue, I won't but I'll probably still write it for myself.**_

_**Anyway, thanks to everyone whose reviewed so far.**_

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_The fear_

_Of being_

_What you_

_Can't control_

_The fear_

_Of controlling_

_What they_

_Can be_

_The fear_

_Of living_

_A life_

_You have_

_No say in_

_Are those_

_What you're_

_Afraid of?_

_Or are_

_You afraid_

_of living_

_A life_

_You can_

_Control?_

Natsume watched as the AAO members crumpled. His earpiece crackled to life and he started.

"The Britain facility has been invaded. We are not to expect help from them." Natsume groaned. This was bad. The America branch was going to take another twelve hours to come, if they came at all. They would probably just go to the Britain branch because it was closer.

"Natsume, what's going on?" Natsume spun around. He had almost forgotten Mikan was there. "Aren't we going to go back to Kanjouinyuu-chan?"

Natsume considered saying no, but then decided against it. "One minute." Mikan nodded and he watched to see if any other AAO members fell. Most had run away, but the rest were either unconscious or dead. Nodding, he and Mikan ran across the body-strewn battlefield and entered the middle school building. It was only then that Natsume let down the firewall around the two of them.

Mikan raced down the hall and up the stairs, Natsume trailing close behind her. When she flung open the door of the DA room, she gave a small shriek and ran over to Oujou, who was lying motionless on the floor. Natsume rushed over and knelt beside her, checking Oujou's pulse. Mikan shook Oujou's shoulder and she stirred a little, then relaxed.

Suddenly she lashed out, fighting invisible foes.

"Hold her down," Natsume ordered. He held down Oujou's bucking legs while Mikan held her flailing arms. Slowly, Oujou calmed down and grew still again.

"Kazu," she mumbled, "get out of here. I don't want to hurt you. Please. Please, Kazu. You have to get out of here." Tears streamed down Oujou's face before she started coughing violently. Her eyes flew blindly open as she clutched at her throat. Natsume placed a hand on her shoulder and she jumped, staring at him with wide eyes.

"Did I…do it? Did it work?" Natsume nodded in agreement to Oujou's whispered questions.

"We need to get out of here now. It—" But he never got to finish his sentence. A hailstorm of bullets flew through the window. Oujou pulled Mikan down, but was struck in the leg and fell over.

"Do you have any idea where Imai is? The older Imai." Natsume shook his head and Oujou sighed. She ripped off her other sleeve, tore it into pieces, and set it on the floor. Then she dug into the hole in her leg and pulled the bullet out. After setting it on the floor, Oujou picked up the strips of cloth and wrapped them around her leg.

"Stop worrying about me, Hyuuga. And Nogi needs to calm down; Yuu needs to stop talking to Imai; Imai needs to get more sleep; Koko needs to stop reading Anna's mind; Sakura, now is _not_ the time to be thinking about things like that." Mikan blushed as Natsume stared at Oujou interestedly.

"How do you know all of that? We could use something like that."

Oujou pulled her hair back behind her ears, revealing earring-less ears. "I took off my control devices, but they seem to have been shot, so I can't really put them back on. Do either of you have a pen or marker or something?" Mikan shook her head, but Natsume just ignored the question.

Oujou groaned and fumbled around, finally picking up a broken piece of glass. She ran it over the back of her hand, drawing a thin read symbol. When she finished, the mark glowed red before turning black. Oujou stared at the two of them for a minute before bursting out laughing.

"You seriously don't know what this is?" She laughed incredulously until Natsume glared at her and she stopped. "OK. Each power has a symbol that works like a temporary control device, but only they each only last for at most half an hour. If drawn using blood, they can last up to an hour. This one is for empathy. I need some sort of control device for my empathy or it'll drain my life faster than ever. Not that I should last beyond the invasion, anyway." Oujou winced. Wobbling, she stood up, bent over backwards to a bridge, and flipped over to her feet.

"Oh yeah, sorry about rambling on about the emotions before. I'm so used to doing that that I didn't realize it was out loud. Anyway, we should go. They know we're here." Natsume nodded and the three of them left the room.

When they were about to leave the building, Oujou turned to Natsume and Mikan. "Hyuuga, take Sakura to the underground base and stay there with her. I'll help fight the AAO members."

Natsume frowned. "You aren't in a position to be giving orders."

"Hyuuga, I am probably going to die during this invasion anyway. I want to get as much doe as possible. If you're smart, you can live past this invasion. GO." Natsume nodded reluctantly and pulled Mikan out of the building, putting a firewall around them the second they opened the door.

Oujou sighed. _I'm alone._

_------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------_

Oujou ran through the dense forest, pursuing a tall man in an all black outfit. Suddenly, he spun around. Oujou felt her entire body go cold, then a sharp pain sear through her cheek. The man swore and continued running. Oujou felt her body thaw out, and she fell on the ground, coughing. The second she could move again, she was off, chasing the man again.

A shot rang out behind her and she ducked, but the bullet still hit her in the back of the leg. This time the person behind her swore. Recognizing the person's voice, she spun around.

_Kazu?_

_------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------_

"Natsume, what's going on?" Natsume turned to Mikan as he continued to pull her towards the entrance of the underground area.

"The AAO is here. Now we need to get underground as fast as possible. Hurry up, slowpoke." Mikan stuck her tongue out at Natsume, but her noticed that her speed still increased.

Finally, they reached the entrance and, after Natsume made sure that nobody was there watching for them, clamored in. Inside, they were greeted by Hotaru and Ruka.

"Imai, apparently you need to get more sleep and Ruka needs to calm down." Hotaru raised an eyebrow coolly, but didn't pull out her Baka Gun.

"I'm guessing that Oujou told you that. Where is she?"

"Outside."

Hotaru nodded and walked over to the wall. Letting her feet slide out from underneath her, she sank to the ground.

"That baka had better come back."

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_**OK. That was pretty long for me. I hope you liked it and please review.**_


	16. Nothing Gained, Nothing Lost

_**OK. Here it is. Thanks all of you that have reviewed so far. The invasion is almost over. Oh yeah, I noticed that I am one of the only non-MikanNatsume fanfics. YAY ME! I'm so proud of myself. Anyway, enjoy.**_

_------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------_

_No matter how far you run_

_No matter how well you hide_

_We will find you._

_That is what they told her._

_So she ran to the ends of the earth_

_And hid in a million different places._

_But they still found her._

_And then she realized that there was one place_

_Where they could never find her._

_So she died._

_And now she is free._

"Kazu, what's going on?" Kazu walked over to Oujou and touched her cheek gently.

"I'm sorry, Kanjouinyuu." A shot rang out overhead and the two of them broke apart. Kazu turned around and took off running through the forest. Oujou watched as the distance between them grew larger. Turning around with renewed confidence, Oujou raced towards the buildings.

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"I need to get out of here." Natsume started to walk towards the exit, but was stopped by someone hugging him from behind. Looking backwards, he saw Mikan's face an inch from his own.

"Please don't go, Natsume. None of us want you to." Natsume turned around more and caught Ruka's eyes. Ruka nodded, understanding.

"Get off of me, baka." Shoving Mikan off, Natsume strode coldly out of the room.

A few seconds later, Natsume had climbed the ladder and was outside. It was calmer outside, but tense, like the air was filled with death. A knife flew at his head, forcing hi to jump out of the way. Seconds later, he saw a person clad in all black run-limping towards him. When she got closer he realized that it was Oujou.

Natsume raced towards her and finally they reached each other. Natsume looked at her and realized that she had been shot at least a few more times.

"You're bleeding." Oujou looked down at her clothes, then back up with a no-duh look.

"That's what happens when you get shot." Oujou's eyes widened. "Where's Sakura?"

"She's in the underground compound." Oujou frowned, so Natsume said, "Don't underestimate her friends." Oujou nodded.

"I know. There are still people on the grounds. We need to find them." Natsume nodded and the two of them took off running.

"Who in the DA class is still standing?" Oujou glanced at Natsume, who had slowed down so she could keep up with him.

"I don't know. Andou has fallen, but he isn't dead. At least he wasn't ten minutes ago. Headmaster Satsuto's fighting. He's one of the strongest in the school." Natsume nodded. "You can go on ahead. I'm fine."

Natsume sped up, leaving Oujou running behind him. Another shot rang out and a sharp pain flooded her flat stomach, followed by a long gush of warm liquid. Oujou felt a cold appropriate to the February air slowly enter her body and make its way up from her feet. As soon as it reached her spine, she realized that she was done for.

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Flashback 

"_You were never one for games, Hiruka."_

"_And you were never one for beating around the bush, Samori. What do you want?"_

"_Join us in Gakuen Alice. We need you and Kisuke-san."_

"_I'm sorry, Samori, I can't. I have a daughter now. I can't just abandon her."_

"_I have a son. He is going to grow up happy in Gakuen Alice."_

"_No, he won't. Nobody grows up happy in Gakuen Alice. You're too cruel there. Do you want your child to grow up seeing you destroy innocent children's lives?"_

_A small toddler waddled into the room and the woman picked her up affectionately. The man asked, "Is that your daughter?"_

_Hiruka nodded and smiled. "Yes."_

"_You do know that she can never grow up normally." It was a statement, not a question. "She will forever be hunted. She will be safe a Gakuen Alice."_

"_No she won't. I would think that she would be as safe around us as she will be around you, if not safer."_

"_I know that you two are the two most powerful Alice users in the world, but what about when you're gone? Then we can protect her. We can protect your daughter once you're gone, but only if you come with us."_

"_I know that you're the headmaster of the school and you believe in them, but I don't. They've taken far too much away from me for me to."_

_There was a pause, then Samori said, "My son's name is Satsuto." Hiruka's hand flew up to her mouth._

_At that moment, the little girl began babbling to her mother, completely oblivious to the seriousness of the conversation. Hiruka looked down and said, "Ssh, Kanjouinyuu. Go play with Daddy." Hiruka placed the girl on the floor and the girl ran out of the room happily._

"_What am I to you? We're both married now." Samori looked down, trying to figure a way to answer the question._

_Finally, he looked up, meeting her eye. "Satsuto was my best friend."_

"_THE DAMN ACADEMY MURDERED HIM!" Hiruka's scream died and she doubled over, clutching her stomach. Samori rushed over and placed a hand on her shoulder._

"_Ssh. It's alright. Calm down. You're safe." Hiruka looked up, the shadow of a child in her eyes._

"_He died trying to protect me. I killed him, didn't I? I killed Onii-sama."_

_ End of Flashback  
_

_------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------_

Someone was shaking her. Suddenly she was five again and it was her mother waking her up for school. Oujou tried to swat her mother away, but her arm was too heavy.

"Wake up. Come on, wake up. Shit." That wasn't her mother. Oujou opened her eyes slowly and Natsume's blurry face loomed up in front of her. "C'mon, stand up." But before Oujou even got to a standing position, she collapsed against Natsume's chest, unable to hold up her own weight. Natsume groaned and suddenly Oujou's feet were swept out from under her.

"Put me down," she mumbled. "I'll only be a burden."

Natsume rolled his eyes as he started walking. "Shut up. You weigh less that Polkadots." Oujou smiled a little and her eyes closed. She relaxed, lulled by the bobbing motion.

A few minutes later she felt herself being leaned against something and, opening her eyes, she asked, Natsume, looking even blurrier than before, "What's you doing?"

Instead of answering, he said, "Stay here. You should be safe." Oujou tried to protest, but no sound came out. Frustrated, Oujou sank back against the tree and let the darkness take her once again.

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_**How'd you like it? Tell me. Review. DO SOMETHING!! No, really. How did you like it? Oh yeah, Samori, Hiruka, and Kisuke are their first names. Just FYI.  
**_


	17. Birthday Surprise

_**Ok. The invasion is over. Thanks to everyone who has reviewed so far. I hope you enjoy this chapter.**_

_------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------_

_It was because of her that he broke_

_Because of her that he found himself again_

_And because of her that he died_

"I think she's waking up."

"No, she's not, you idiot."

"Meanie."

"If you're going to make so much noise, you're going to wake her up."

"Will all of you just shut up?"

Oujou opened her tired eyes and waited for her vision to clear enough so that she could distinguish shapes enough to tell where she was. She couldn't move. She was too weak and it hurt too much.

"She's awake!"

Oujou winced at the loud noise and closed her eyes again. The noise died down as she tried fruitlessly to pull herself into a sitting position against the wall. Opening her eyes again, she asked, "What happened?"

"We won. Well, in a way. A few primary school students were taken, but nobody died." Oujou smiled weakly at the pale headmaster who had just supplied her with that uplifting information. "You got shot a few times, so you aren't allowed out of bed for a while."

"Do you know what happened to a boy from the AAO with…uh…blue hair and blue eyes, around my age?"

Oujou looked at Natsume, who answered," I killed him."

A choked sob tore up her raw throat and she screamed a harsh, inhuman scream. Hot tears ran down her face and for once she didn't try to stop them.

Satsuto placed a hand on her shoulder and said, "You need to calm down. You've been asleep for a few days. You're body's still weak."

Oujou froze. "What day is it?"

"February 11. Why?" Oujou stared at them for a moment before bursting out in hysterical giggles.

"It's my birthday. It's my goddamn birthday." Oujou started coughing violently and curled up, her stomach on fire.

Subaru walked in and over to Oujou. "You all need to get out," he announced. "Visiting hours are over." Hotaru, Mikan, Satsuto, and Natsume filed out of the room, leaving only Subaru and Oujou. "What hurts?"

Oujou whispered, "nothing." Subaru frowned and placed a hand on her forehead. Oujou winced at the cool touch, but didn't fight it, and finally the pain receded.

"Do you need anything?"

"Can I leave," Oujou asked, knowing full well what the answer would be.

Subaru looked appalled. "No, you can't leave. You just woke up. You shouldn't get out of bed for the next few days." Oujou sank back against the pillow, feeling helpless.

"Um…Imai, who was injured during the invasion?" Subaru looked at her and saw an emotion that resembled guilt flooding her eyes.

"Andou got badly hurt, but the headmaster patched him up pretty quickly. Hyuuga, Sakura, the headmaster, and about eight or nine other students got mildly injured, but they've already healed." Oujou nodded. "You need to rest. I'll check on you later." And with that, Subaru left the room.

Oujou closed her eyes to stop the ever-persistent tears from spilling out. "Kazu's dead. That goddamn idiot got himself killed. That stupid idiot…" Her whisper trailed off and the tears finally rained down her face in an ever-coming torrent.

There was in ache in her heart that had nothing to do with her wounds. Slowly, she slid her stiff legs off the bed and tried to stand on her bandaged soles. Immediately, the room spun and she fell over forwards. Oujou lay on the floor, unable to move, scarcely breathing. Everything went red, then black.

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It wasn't real. Oujou knew it wasn't real. But it was so realistic, for a moment, Oujou doubted herself.

_Natsume stood in the forest, throwing knives sticking out of the tree thirty feet in front of him. Hotaru walked up from behind him and touched his shoulder._

"_I know that you're upset that he was taken, but that's no reason not to sleep."_

_Natsume turned around and their shadow-ringed eyes met. He smirked. "I could say the same to you."_

"_You could."_

_There was no way to respond to that. Natsume walked up to the tree and pulled the knives out, pocketing them as he went. When he finished, he walked back to his started position and, taking aim for a second, threw his first knife. After he had thrown all but one, Hotaru tapped him on the shoulder again._

"_Give me the knife." Reluctantly, Natsume handed the long thin knife to her. Hotaru fingered the knife for a second then threw it. It shot down the stretch of air and buried itself deep into the trunk of the tree, dead in the center._

"_You could say the same to me." She smiled, a gesture uncharacteristic of her. "And you would be right."_

_------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------_

Yet again Oujou was awakened by voices. This time they were worried voices, hushed voices, angry voices.

"She was trying to escape."

"Her wounds opened up again."

"What was she thinking?"

"I didn't think she's be this stupid."

Oujou opened her eyes and saw Subaru, Satsuto, Narumi, and Natsume standing around her bed. Satsuto grabbed her shoulders and shouted, "What the hell were thinking? Your wounds opened up again! If you hadn't been found when you were, you would've died!"

Oujou, who had been lying there silently during his rant, stared him in the eye and said, "But I didn't? Satsuto gave a small gasp and his hands fell to his sides.

"What are you trying to prove? That you're strong? That you don't care if you die?"

"That you're human?" Oujou stared at Natsume in amazement. He met her gaze with startling crimson eyes.

"You don't understand. HE WAS MY BEST FRIEND!!!" Oujou stared to pull herself up, but was held back by two sets of hands.

"Let me out of here." They were all surprised by her sudden calmness. "You killed him. Let me out of here."

"We can't do that. You'll die."

"I don't care. I need to get out of here. I NEED TO BE ABLE TO FEEL SORROW!!!!!!"

Satsuto looked at her in surprise. "You can feel sorrow here."

"No I can't. I'm pumped with so many goddamn painkillers that I can't feel freaking sorrow. Let me out of here." But they all shook their heads (except for Natsume, who was staring out the window.).

"I'll let you out in a week, if you behave and calm down."

"A week. Or I'm leaving on my own."

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Oujou walked slowly across the devastated campus, still getting used to using her crutches. Her abdomen and arms were bandaged and her cheek had a bandage covering the spot where the bullet had grazed her.

Oujou stopped for a minute and took in the damage. Many of the trees were burnt and the ground was still covered in ash even though the ordeal had been almost two weeks prior. Scuffing her left foot a little into the ground, she could see a faint bloodstain on the ground.

Struck with a sudden thought, she walked through the empty campus towards the Sakura, hoping to find Natsume. She needed someone to talk to and he would probably understand her best.

But he wasn't there. And neither was the Sakura tree, exactly. All that stood there was the burnt remnants of a once beautiful tree.

Tripping on a root, she went stumbling into the once-tree. Leaning on it for a support, she saw a pink petal flat down in front of her. She looked up.

The tree was alive.

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_**OK. If you want me to continue, tell me. If anyone tells me to, I will. That was why I did that oh-so-mean cliffhanger. Anyway, how did you like it? Tell me. And that was my longest chapter ever. And I'll probably continue to write it anyway.**_


	18. A New Beginning

_**Two things. One, I**_**am**_** continuing because my friend asked me to. Also, this chapter begins the arc about her parents. I hope you enjoy. **_

* * *

_At the end of the day, she gave away the last of her hope,_

_The last of her faith,_

_The last of her light_

_In this dark world_

_And so she was alone._

_And so she stumbled._

_And fell._

_And was lost._

_The tree was alive._

Oujou's eyes widened and she stumbled backwards away from the tree. Slowly, she walked back towards the building, forcing herself to keep her gaze locked forward.

"You're not supposed to be walking around." Oujou spun around; Natsume was standing a few feet from her, his face completely blank.

She grimaced. "I know."

"They're going to kill you."

"I know," she repeated. Anxiously, she fingered her crutches and clenched her fists. Yet again, she began walking towards the buildings again, her mind whirling.

Natsume casually walked beside her as they made their way towards the large brick buildings. Suddenly thinking of something, she asked, "Where's Sakura?"

"Class." Oujou smiled and snorted quietly.

A hand was thrown over her shoulder, startling her for a second. Looking to the left, she saw Headmaster Satsuto next to her, his furious eyes not quite matching his impassive face.

"You're not supposed to be walking around." Oujou rolled her eyes and, to her annoyance, heard Natsume suppressing laughter as he walked away from the two of them.

"I know that."

Headmaster Satsuto groaned in frustration. "Then why are you?"

"I needed the exercise." Silent, Headmaster Satsuto pulled her into the building and down to her room.

When they reached her room, he pushed her gently down onto the bed, then sat next to her. "Are you _insane_? Do you want to hurt yourself again?"

"No. But I told you—I needed the exercise. I can't spend all my time sitting around in this goddamn room."

Suddenly, the headmaster asked, "He was your friend, wasn't he? The one who died, I mean."

A choke rose up from her throat. "I loved him. He was my only friend for so long, and then he died because of me." Oujou bowed her head, attempting—and failing—to keep the tears from running down her face.

Gently, Headmaster Satsuto wiped them away, his long finger trailing lightly along her cheek for a moment.

"You should get some rest. You have exams tomorrow."

Oujou looked up at him like he was insane. "You're serious?" He nodded. "Fine, I'll take them. But I'm not going to rest. It's not a good idea." The headmaster opened his mouth to argue, but she cut him off with the shake of her head. "I'm not lying. Especially now."

He sighed. "I guess."

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Hoards of students crowded around a small piece of paper tacked to the wall, all anxiously trying to see if they had passed the test. Sighs of relief were heard, along with shouts out outrage.

"Who got in first?" Oujou asked curiously, not really caring enough to go up and look. Yuu walked up to the paper, and then back to her, his eyes wide.

"You." Oujou blinked, then silently walked over to the list of scores. Then she walked back and leaned against the wall, her arms folded.

For a second, she smiled. "I guess I need to go talk to Headmaster Satsuto."

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"Oujou Kanjouinyuu must report to the Headmaster's office immediately." Oujou looked up from the desk she had been staring blankly at and stood up, following the messenger out of the room. Silently, the two of them walked down the hallway until they reached the Headmaster's office. Oujou entered alone.

Headmaster Satsuto greeted her as she closed the door behind her. "Come in. Sit down, sit down."

Oujou shook her head stiffly. "I would prefer to stand."

"Nonsense." Satsuto gave a casual flick of his hand and Oujou found herself stepping jerkily towards—and finally sitting down—on a couch near his desk. "So, I heard that you got the highest score on the exam." Oujou shrugged. "Now you are allowed to go back to civilization for a week. What do you say?"

Oujou shrugged again. "What's the catch?"

Satsuto suddenly looked uncomfortable. "Well, um…you'll need to go with an escort."

Oujou narrowed her eyes dangerously. "The person who wins always gets and escort."

"You would, um"—he paused—"have to go with me." Oujou blinked, then started to stand up calmly. The headmaster shook his head and Oujou sat back down—unwillingly, I might add. "Just listen to me. You wouldn't have to protect me or anything like that. I would just be someone accompanying you."

Oujou raised an eyebrow questioningly. "Then why was I your 'bodyguard' when you were going to the AAO?"

Satsuto flinched. "That was more for me and Natsume to protect you," he admitted. "And protocol."

"Look, I'm not some weak little kid that needs your protection."

"I know," he sighed. "That's the problem."**  
**

* * *

_**Sorry that it's not great. I've been SO busy and stuff, so I just wrote most of this today. Heh heh. Please review.**_


	19. Returning Home

_**Here it is. Later than I would have hoped, but, what can you do? Anyway, please enjoy.**_

* * *

_Time goes, you say? Ah no, alas, time stays, we go._

_-Henry Austin Dobson_

"_I know," he sighed. "That's the problem._

Oujou blinked. "What the hell are you talking about?"

Satsuto frowned. "Are you going or not?"

"I'm going. But I swear to God, you are not going to risk yourself to protect me." Satsuto narrowed his eyes, but didn't respond. "Can I go now?" Satsuto nodded, his eyes still distracted.

Oujou stood up gracefully from the couch and walked out of the room. Satsuto watched her go, his expression troubled and his lips tight.

* * *

"Are you letting her leave is the best idea, _sir_?" Persona asked in his normal, silky-yet-incredibly-creepy voice.

Satsuto glowered at him. "She's going to be fine. I _can_ take care of her."

"Reo knows that you're going. You're not getting off as easy this time."

Groaning, Satsuto leaned back in his chair, resting his head on his hands. "We can't just force her to stay here. She _will_ try to leave and then she _will_ be taken. And we can't risk that, especially not now."

Persona vanished and Satsuto stood up, disappearing barely a second later.

* * *

"So, you're leaving," Natsume muttered as Oujou walked up to the table he was sitting—and pretending to eat—at and sat down. She nodded and laid her head on the table, massaging her temples with her fingers.

After a minute, Oujou lifted her head up and took a marker out of her pocket, quickly drawing the same symbol from the night of the invasion on her hand before laying her head back on the hard cafeteria table.

"You look like crap," Natsume said quietly, his voice completely emotionless.

Oujou narrowed her eyes. "Thanks ever so much," she muttered sarcastically. Then she frowned and explained, "There's something wrong with my alice. It's way too strong."

"Control device?"

Oujou nodded, lifting her head up and leaning back in her chair. "One on each ear, plus one on my wrist and one on my ankle. It's more than ever before, and they're still not working nearly as well as it should." And then she laughed softly, the sound hard. "You actually care, Hyuuga. I'm honored."

Natsume tsk-ed with his tongue and turned back to the food he was eating, but not before Oujou caught him glancing at Mikan again, his eyes surprisingly soft.

Oujou laughed. "That was almost be sweet, if I didn't have to feel it as well." Natsume snickered. "I'm serious. Try living with all of this for all of your life." She frowned thoughtfully. "You haven't really lost anyone, have you?"

Natsume frowned but didn't respond.

* * *

"This is idiotic," Oujou muttered, staring at Satsuto as he sat next to her in the limo. He smiled at her as he snapped on his seatbelt.

"This is just to keep you safe," Satsuto reminded her, his eyes sparkling with an unfamiliar emotion. Oujou felt her heart lurch slightly and she frowned, then closed her eyes, mentally counting the number of control devices she had on at the time. _4_.

Then she opened her eyes again, staring out the window. "Do you happen to have any other control devices?" she asked quietly.

Satsuto frowned. "No. But why do you need anymore? It looks like you have three on already."

"Four," she corrected quietly. "But I can still feel all of your emotions." Oujou winced. "_All_ of them."

Satsuto cringed, then hastily changed the subject. "We're going to your hometown?" he asked quickly.

Oujou nodded. "Of course. But then there's somewhere I want to go and it would be _much_ more convenient if I didn't ride in the limo to get there."

Raising an eyebrow, Satsuto asked, "Where is it?"

"Next town over," Oujou muttered. Something flashed on her cheek and it took Satsuto a second to realize that it was a tear.

"Why are you crying?" he asked curiously.

Oujou cringed, then angrily wiped her hand across her pale cheek, erasing all signs of the tear that had been there just a moment ago. She then shook her head, and returned to staring out the window and the vivid sunset. Oujou didn't resond.

Every so often she would wince slightly, bite her lip, and slowly relax—well, pseudo-relax—again, only to repeat this a few minutes later. Satsuto gave up trying to comfort her after the first time he touched her, where she bit her bottom lip so hard it started bleeding and flinched away from his hesitant hand.

Finally, he asked, "What's wrong?"

Oujou cringed at his voice—it was the first real noise that there had been in over an hour. "I can feel…exactly how you feel about me. And I know that you can't help it, but I really cannot handle this right now. It's way too hard."

"Sorry."

* * *

_**Um, well, it's over. I hope you liked it, anyone who actually read it. Please review to let me know that you're out there, all you people.**_


	20. Building an Army

_**OMG, sorry for taking so long. I had a math project, and ASK7 is coming up (That's the NJ standardized test, which is next week), and I'm really busy and stuff. I'm really sorry. Well, here it is.**_

* * *

Headmaster Satsuto frowned. "Why is it so hard now? You didn't have this much trouble being around me before."

Oujou didn't look up at him as she answered. "That's because before Kazu was still alive. There was still some hope, some chance that I could…" She trailed off. "But now he's gone and he's never coming back. There's no hope anymore."

Shaking his head, Satsuto laid his hand on her shoulder. "Don't say that. There's still hope. Even though so much has happened, there's still hope." Oujou closed her eyes, resting her head in her hands. The car jolted a little as it went over a speed bump, but she didn't seem to notice.

Finally, Oujou looked up. "What happened during the invasion? Who was taken?"

"About eight or nine elementary school students and one high school student were taken. I don't think you know any of them, but their alices are the summoning of spirits, air, water, the control of darkness, telekinesis, intangibility, invisibility, illusions, and hypnosis. They're building an army."

Oujou's eyes widened and gained a gleam of understanding. "No," she murmured softly. "They're not just building an army. They're starting a war." Satsuto's eyes widened as well and he sat back, contemplating when Oujou had just said.

Finally, he closed his eyes and sighed, running his hand through his tousled dark green hair. "Why would they start a war now?"

Oujou looked down. "Now they know where I am. They want me now, so I'm guessing they wanted me before." She frowned. "Are you going to tell me why they want me, or am I supposed to figure it out myself?"

Headmaster Satsuto grimaced, and he hesitated for a moment. "It's…complicated. It has to do with your parents."

Oujou's eyes narrowed as she stared at her lap. "My parents are dead."

"I know. It's what they used to be. You can't—I—" He trailed off. Rolling her eyes, Oujou brushed a lock of black hair out of her face and sighed.

"This was so much easier when I only had to worry about going from day to day without killing anybody." Headmaster Satsuto snickered.

"We've arrived," the driver called from the front seat. Oujou grabbed the crutches, which were lying on her lap, and pulled open her door, blinking against the bright sunlight. Setting her crutches on the ground, she stood up, slamming the door of the limo closed behind her. Satsuto walked around to her side of the car.

"We're here. Where would you like to go first?"

Oujou frowned. "My parent's grave," she answered after a moment. Headmaster Satsuto nodded and Oujou began to lead the way, him walking next to her, always staying about two or three feet away from her.

Finally, he said, "I'm sorry that I can't tell you more than that. I will be able to later, but I have to do something first."

They continued walking in silence for a while. "I'm guessing that you aren't going to tell me why you're coming with me," Oujou announced a few minutes later.

Satsuto made a face. "Reo," was all he said. Oujou groaned and sped up a little, walking ahead of Satsuto, towards the top of the hill they were walking up.

In front of her spanned a huge expanse of buildings and streets, miniature people visible from the distance.

"I'm home," she murmured softly.

Satsuto walked up beside her and together the two of them stared down at Oujou's hometown. A minute later, Oujou sighed and began to head down the hill, her crutches clicking at every step. Satsuto kept pace with her easily; he wasn't hampered by anything.

"My parents lived in this town all of their lives," Oujou said, her voice cracking and her throat tight.

To her surprise, Satsuto shook his head, smiling tightly. "No, not all of their lives. They lived in Gakuen Alice from when they were each…six, I think, till they graduated." Oujou's eyes widened.

"How do you know that?"

"My father was the headmaster of the school. He actually went to school with them; he was in their class."

Oujou frowned, but she just continued walking, her eyes focused on the path in front of her. "Who did you lose?" she asked suddenly. Satsuto looked up at her, startled.

Finally, he answered, "Both of my parents. They both died at the hands of the AAO. They were both murdered. My mother—it was her first time out of bed in three years. She was walking with my father and—" He broke off, his voice suddenly tight.

"Do you know how my parents died?" Satsuto didn't answer. "I killed them. I killed my parents, and the last thing that they said to me was 'God did not give you this power to hurt.' But I did hurt people with it. I have hurt people."

Satsuto frowned, then said, "There was once a girl that said something to me that I still remember today. She said, 'People do things for three reasons: because they want to, because they have to, or because they have no choice. Please help those that have no choice."

"And then she asked you something," Oujou whispered. "She asked you, 'If you could change one thing about yourself, what would it be?'"

Satstuo smiled slightly. "And then I answered, 'I would change my fear of showing people who I really am.'"

"And then she laughed and said, 'I wish I could change whatever makes Mommy unhappy, because Mommy doesn't smile anymore." Oujou paused for a second, then bowed her head, tears running down her face and dripping onto the dry ground, which sucked up the salty water eagerly.

Satsuto laid his hand on her shoulder and she looked up, her eyes agonized. "You knew them," she whispered. "Why didn't you tell me?"

Frowning, Satsuto replied, "I wasn't allowed to. But things have changed and you have to know the whole story. We need you on our side."

Oujou sneered at him, her face hard. "So that's the only reason that you're being nice to me; you just want me on your side." Her anger was slightly dulled by the tears still running down her cheeks; he brushed them away gently with his fingertips. Oujou flinched away from his touch.

"No, it's not. I met your parents and my father knew your parents and I—" He broke off, looking chagrined. Oujou looked back down, her expression like she was trying not to look upset, but failing. "Look, we can do this, but we should stay out of the open as much as possible. Right now we're a perfect target for snipers."

"Snipers are what you're worried about?" Oujou murmured softly. Satsuto laughed gently, but the sound was wrong. Changing the subject, Oujou asked, "How long is this little…outing, anyway?"

"Week," Satsuto replied. Oujou changed directions suddenly and Satsuto almost ran into her, then changed directions as well, walking beside her. "Where are you going?"

Oujou looked up at him and cocked a black eyebrow. "My parent's graves. I told you that already."

They walked for a few more minutes in silence, until Satsuto said, "I have something to tell you."

* * *

**_Well, it's finally done. The chapter, I mean, not the story. Again, sorry for taking so long and I'll try to post again soon._**


	21. Nothing More, Nothing Less

_**Hello. Sorry, I've been really, really busy and stuff. I had something almost every day for the past week or so, and I've also been rehearsing for this big band concert I have on June 10**__**th**__**. We play rock music in our school band. Our band (excuse the pun) rocks! Well, here it is. Enjoy.**_

_--_

_Time is the school in which we learn,  
Time is the fire in which we burn._

_-Delmore Schwartz_

Oujou stared at him incredulously. "Oh, so _now_ you have something to tell me."

Satsuto grimaced. "There's a reason that so many people are after you, and were after your parents. They were—" He broke off, swearing vividly under his breath. Oujou swore as well, grabbing his arm and dragging him with her towards the nearest tree. "We really need to get out of here. There's a—"

"Sniper," she finished. "Yeah, I know. Look, I know somewhere close by that we can go. It's about as safe as you're going to get here." Satsuto nodded and together they began to run—as fast as possible, as they were hampered by Oujou's injuries and crutches—towards a section of the hill that Oujou was leading them towards.

A few moment later they reached their destination, and Oujou shoved Satsuto into the human-sized opening in the hill, waited for the thump that signified that he had landed, then climbed in herself. She landed awkwardly and stumbled forward, falling into Satsuto. He steadied her, his hands gripping her shoulders; she winced and tried to pull away. He let go immediately.

"Sorry," he muttered. Oujou nodded, turning to punch a few numbers into a keypad next to her head. A metal cover screeched closed overhead, blocking out all sunlight. Immediately, lights turned on.

Satsuto looked around. In the cavernous room they currently inhabited, computers monitors lined the walls; all were off, their blank screens reflecting the light coming from the bulbs recessed into the ceiling.

"What is this place?" Satsuto demanded, peering intently around the room.

Oujou frowned. "It was my…secret hideout when I was a kid. My parents also used it and sometimes we would come in here for days on end."

"To hide," Satsuto murmured. Oujou blinked.

"What?" Oujou was confused; that much was evident in her expression, which she was determined—and failing—to keep blank.

Satsuto frowned, looking like a little kid caught with his hand in the cookie jar. "I'll finish what I was telling you before. Your parents were the most powerful Alice-users in the world."

--

_**Flashback**_

"_Mommy, mommy," a young __Kanjouinyuu called to her mother, the beautiful, black-haired Hiruka. Hiruka's features were petite and haunting, and her long sleeves—even in summer—neatly covered the scars that run up and down the length of both of her arms from the many missions she went on during her childhood—if you could call it that._

_"__What is it, honey?" Hiruka asked, picking Kanjouinyuu up._

_Kanjouinyuu grinned, her straight white teeth glimmering. "Where are we going? Daddy won't tell me." She tried to pull her mouth into a pout, but she was smiling too hard._

_Hiruka wasn't smiling as she glanced over to her husband, Kisuke, watching as he stuffed clothes into a small suitcase. "Won't he? We're going on a trip, honey, to the secret place. You remember the secret place, right?" __Kanjouinyuu nodded, happy._

_Kanjouinyuu wiggled down from her perch in her mother's arms and ran out of the room to find her dolls to play with. Hiruka immediately walked over to Kisuke. "When should we tell her that I'm pregnant?" Hiruka asked softly, laying her head on Kisuke's shoulder._

"_We can tell her after the threat has passed. But what are we going to do when our children—"_

"_If they survive," Hiruka broke in._

_Kisuke nodded. "If they survive, what are we going to tell them when they are older, old enough to understand alices and what is going on? Will we tell them who we are, and why we always have to hide? Will we tell them about Gakuen Alice and your brother and the missions? What if we die before they get a chance to grow up? What if one of them dies?"_

_Closing her eyes, Hiruka answered, "We can deal with that when they grow up. Right now we have to focus on today." Suddenly, a phone rang from a night table on one side of their bed and Hiruka walked over and picked it up; it was a black cell phone. "Yes…What? No, he can't—" _

_She was cut off by the other person's rushed words. "Are you positive?" Her voice, hysteric a moment ago, was calm now, methodical. "I can come…No, I am _not_ giving up my only child to you…I don't care what you think, but she's so much safer with us than she would ever by with you…She's _four_. She isn't your plaything...Good bye."_

_Kisuke frowned. "Who was that?" Hiruka waited a moment before answering, closing the phone and placing it back in the exact spot she had taken it from before speaking._

"_It was the Academy. Samori's dead."_

_**End of Flashback**_

--

Oujou nodded and walked over to one of the many chairs, sitting down. "You need to tell me everything. Start from the beginning." Satsuto walked over to another chair, one close to her, and sat down, resting his head in his hands as he began.

"Your parents were known as the most powerful alice users of all time. They were much more powerful than Hyuuga-san is now, and he is one of the most powerful now. Your mother had Nullification and Empathy. Your father had the Exchange of energy. They both went to the Academy from when they were six till they were eighteen. Your mother also had a brother…Satsuto-sama, and he died protecting her on a mission.

Satsuto shuddered suddenly, remembering. "While they were at the Academy, your mother and my father were…lovers." Oujou cringed, absentmindedly fingering her crutches. "After Satsuto-sama died, they knew that they could never be a couple. Your mother couldn't bear to stay at the Academy, and my father, forced to uphold the family tradition of being the headmaster, couldn't leave. Your parents, who were friends in the Academy, left when they were eighteen, and got married a few years later. They dropped off the radar for a while after that.

"Eventually, my father found them. And you." He slumped back in the chair. "He visited the three of you every few months for years, up until a few months before he died." Oujou got the impression that he was omitting something from his story. "Both the AAO and the central Academy Headquarters in Paris wanted your parents. That's why you're so…important. You are their only child. You could be more powerful than they were."

Oujou made a face. "_Thanks_." Satsuto smiled, but it didn't reach anywhere near his eyes.

"Your parents were amazing. I was named after Satsuto-sama. He was my father's best friend."

Frowning, Oujou asked, "Why do you call him Satsuto-_sama_?"

Satsuto hesitated for a moment, reluctant to answer. Finally, he explained, "My father always told me that Satsuto-sama should always be respected, because he gave his life for your mother."

Oujou's voice was amused as she replied, "Lovely. My mother's brother is addressed more highly than the headmaster. Isn't that just _wonderful_?" Satsuto snickered and sat up straight in the chair. He turned it around to stare at one of the computers.

"What _is_ all this stuff?" he demanded. Oujou frowned and started to get up to look at it. Satsuto shook his head. "You don't have to get up. I can check it." But Oujou continued to stand up and, placing her crutches on the ground, limp over. She leaned over and turned on the tower, then the monitor. The screen flickered to life and a moment later it logged on automatically.

Oujou clicked on "My Documents" in the start menu, and almost immediately, lines of files began to appear. She clicked on one labeled "Academy". A long list of Word documents appeared. Frowning, she began scrolling through them until she reached on labeled "Missions".

Curious, she opened it. Text filled up the screen almost immediately, running down over ten pages.

"What _is_ this?"

--

_**I won't give you any promises, but I will post before June 19, which is my last day of school. After next week, I shouldn't be so busy. After the 29**__**th**__**, I think, I'm going to be away for three weeks, so I won't be able to post then, but I promise to post at least twice before then.**_

_**Thank you.**_


	22. Past and Future Lies

_**I said I would post before the 19**__**th**__** and here it is. Hope you enjoy. This chapter is all in the past. It touches on something important for later on.**_

--

_With time comes only a way to dull the pain, not a way to remove it.  
__With hope comes only a way to tear open your heart again and again.__  
With love comes only a way to risk everything.__  
With pain comes only a measure of resistance.  
With truth comes only sorrow._

"This isn't your fight, Hiruka. You don't need to come along with me," Satsuto muttered to his sister as the two of them headed through the North Forest towards the gate. Hiruka shrugged and adjusted her mask, straightening it out and making sure she could see through the eye holes as well as she would ever be able to.

Then she smiled at Satsuto, even though she know that he wouldn't be able to see it. "You're my brother and this is an important mission. And anyway, they didn't say I couldn't come."

"This is going to be dangerous. You could get hurt."

Sixteen-year-old Hiruka rolled her eyes. "C'mon. You're only a year older than me and I'm almost as strong as you. I'll be _fine_." At that moment, she landed on a post on the gate, followed closely behind by her older brother.

Narumi was standing in front of them, his eyes invisible in the darkness of the night. "So, both of you," he muttered to himself before fixing a cheerful smile on his face. Raising his voice so they could both hear him, he said, "You both know what you have to do. Be careful. This is an all or nothing deal."

Hiruka and Satsuto leapt off of the gate and disappeared into the night. Narumi watched them go, his smile slipping back into a frown. "They're so much like Yuka-senpai. I hope all ends well for them." And then he turned back and returned to the Academy.

Hiruka and Satsuto ran together towards the location of the target, a wealthy politician who was financing the AAO. After years of intensive training, both of their bodies were hard and tough and they were barely out of breath even though they had ran almost three miles.

"This is it," Satsuto announced softly, not even looking at his younger sister. She nodded and they both stood to the side of the road, hidden behind massive amounts of trees, as they waited for the car that was carrying their target.

A few minutes later, it came careening around the bend, going almost twice the speed limit of forty-five miles per hour. Behind it was another car, also black, with no license plate. While the first car continued on, the second car skidded to a halt and five large men wearing dark suits came out, all carrying guns. Satsuto motioned with his hand for Hiruka to follow the first car, but before she could, a shot rang out overhead.

The five men split up, three going after Satsuto, two going after Hiruka. Hiruka attacked the two men—who were much large and seemingly stronger than her—kicking and punching and slashing at them with the dagger she pulled out of her sleeve. From the corner of her eye she could see Satsuto blocking bullets with a shield of ice—his alice.

"You're never going to win this, little girl," one of the men sneered, trying to keep from panting as he blocked yet another one of her potentially bone-shattering kicks. Hiruka merely smiled behind her mask; she could feel his fear, his Herculean effort to keep from collapsing on the ground and weeping in agony.

A lucky kick caught her just below the ribs and she grunted in pain, blindly swiping with her dagger as she fought off nausea. Regaining her balance, she managed to slash the man who had kicked her. She cut his throat. He went down.

Hiruka heard someone swear and turned for a second towards where her brother was fighting. His last opponent was on the ground, sweating and cussing his head off. That second was too much. Her opponent, taking advantage of her momentary distraction, fired off one of his last bullets. She spun back around and tried to dodge, but she wasn't fast enough to do both at once.

The bullet caught her on the side, digging deep into her stomach. Hiruka fell to the ground with a cry of pain. Blood poured out of the wound and she pressed on it, trying futilely to stop it.

Satsuto raced over, putting a shield of ice half a foot above her to protect her. Then he attacked the man, using daggers he created out of ice to fight him. The man pulled out a knife of his own, having no time to accurately fire his gun, and the two began fighting. Satsuto was almost half the man's age, but the man had much more experience fighting, which evened out the playing field, so to speak.

Hiruka watched helplessly as her brother fought for her, and the only thought that passed through her head as she watched her brother weaken was, 'This is all my fault.' Tears slipped down her cheeks as fought to remain conscious—tears for her brother. Tears for the only family she had in this dark, desolate place.

A gunshot rang out and Satsuto staggered, clutching his upper arm, which was gushing blood. Hiruka struggled to straighten out, to see what was going on, but both her wound and the ice above her stopped her. She swore under her breath, still squeezing her side in a fruitless attempt to staunch the flow of blood. Becoming lightheaded, she curled up on her side and tried to crawl out from under the block of ice.

There was movement behind her, a rustling of leaves, and Hiruka twisted around as well as possible so she could see what it was. Her honed senses told her that it wasn't just the wind, that a twig had snapped, although it was almost silent.

Sure enough, a moment later, three people, all wearing masks, stepped out of the woods. They were dressed identically in loose fitting but not baggy black shirt and pants, and the one girl had her hair up in a high ponytail. The two boys raced over to her and one of them helped her out from under the ice, while the girl hurried over to help Satsuto.

The other boy—the one who hadn't pulled her out—set to work healing the gunshot wound on Hiruka's side. "Not me," she rasped. "Satsuto." Exhausted and dizzy from blood loss, she leaned against the boy who had helped her, who she now realized was Samori. He wound an arm around her waist and pulled her close to him. Hiruka tried to pull away, wanting to help her brother, but Samori wouldn't let her.

Another shot rang out and this time Satsuto went down, collapsing on the ground. The girl, who had been trying to figure out how to help without getting in the way, rushed forward to kill the weakened man. Then all four of them rushed over to Satsuto, whose two wounds—one to the arm, one to the stomach—were gushing blood at an alarming rate. The second boy, Subaru Imai, knelt down and began healing Satsuto immediately, but the blood was coming out too fast.

Hiruka, not even noticing the pain of her wound, knelt down on the other side of Satsuto, tears streaming down her face as she held her brother's hand. It was already growing cold. Subaru frowned and pushed his alice harder into Satsuto, but it was too late. He was dying and there was nothing they could do about it.

Satsuto looked up at Hiruka, his eyes already becoming dull, and whispered, "I'm sorry. I'm sorry I couldn't protect you." Hiruka's tears came faster and heavier than before. "I'm so sorry. You shouldn't have had to see this. Please go on with you life." He paused his breathing becoming shallow and weak. His voice was barely audible. "Please, be happy." And then his eyes grew blank and his breathing stopped.

He was gone.

Hiruka didn't know how long she sat there—it could have been hours, or seconds—but finally, against her will, her eyes slipped closed and everything faded into darkness.

--

_**Please review. I will try to post again before the 29**__**th**__**, which is when I am leaving, but no guarantees. I probably will be able to, though.**_


	23. The Target List

_**Ni hao. Anyway, here is the chapter I promised. Hope you enjoy it. The plot is moving again. So, have fun. :)**_

_--_

_Life is the battle that we lose._

_Childhood is the flame that dies far too soon._

_Adulthood is the realization of innocence lost._

_Death is the darkness of the setting sun._

_Age is the world spinning round and round,_

_Strong and steady and forever._

"_What _is_ this?"_

Oujou scrolled back up to the top of the document and began reading. After a few pages, she came across a list of targets, the dates of their assassination—or attempt, and their status. She scanned through it, then realized something: all of the names were people _from the Academy_.

_Target List:_

_Natsuko Yuki—1/4/73—deceased_

_Ninari Misa—6/8/73—escaped_

_Hitsugami Aya—3/4/75—deceased_

_Samai Shinji—9/10/85—deceased_

_Azumi Yuka—6/6/86—escaped_

_Suzumi Kisumai—4/16/87--deceased_

_Mikaru Hisami—11/23/87—unknown (presumed deceased)_

_Yamamoto Takosamo—2/8/88—deceased_

_Tsuyoi Satsuto—5/31/88—deceased_

Oujou frowned and turned to look at Satsuto, who was staring open-mouthed at the computer screen. A moment later he noticed Oujou's furious stare and looked over at her. "I didn't know about this, I swear."

Her mouth twisted slightly and he flinched. He had never seen her this angry—she had always hidden her emotions. Slowly, she took a deep breath and laid her hands back on the keyboard. Oujou turned to stare at the computer screen once again, but her eyes were blank, like she was seeing right through it.

"You're shaking," he noticed.

"So are you," she pointed out.

Satsuto looked down at his quivering hands. "Oh." Biting his lower lip, her muttered, "Was all this really the Academy's doing?"

"Not everything." Oujou's answer surprised him; he looked up at her again. "My parents' death wasn't the Academy's doing. Yuka-san keeping me out of the AAO wasn't the Academy's doing. The Academy may have started this, but all of us are going to finish it. And the AAO's trying to start a war. This isn't the war of the Academy of thirty years ago. This is the war of the Academy of today."

Satsuto nodded, then looked back at the screen. And swore. Loudly. Very loudly. "It wasn't just thirty years ago."

Frowning, Oujou asked, "What are you talking about?"

"Look at the target list. The second one, that starts at the end of the page." Oujou stared at the screen, her eyes slowly widening in horror.

_Target List:_

_Hyuuga Natsume—3/15/02—survived (Japan)_

_Sakura Mikan—10/11/02—survived (Japan)_

_Jacque Morel—1/3/03—deceased (France)_

_Hyuuga Natsume—5/8/03—survived (Japan)_

_Samantha Bentle—6/9/03—deceased (America)_

_Jason Evans—8/23/03—escaped (Britain)_

_Thomas Martin—12/25/02—survived (France)_

_Hyuuga Natsume—6/21/03—survived (Japan)_

_Jonathan Masto—8/18/03—deceased (America)_

_Oujou __Kanjouinyuu—2/8/04—survived (Japan)_

"That was during the invasion," Oujou said, pointing to her name and the date after it. "That would have been the perfect excuse."

Satsuto nodded. "But why would your parents' computer have information that recent? I mean—"

Oujou cut him off by saying, "My parents are _dead_. They aren't involved with this." Her voice was firm, but he still looked skeptical. "I saw them die. I _felt_ them die. They _are_ dead."

Satsuto made a face but didn't pursue it. "So, now what. We can't spend the next week here."

"Actually, we can. This place is equipped with enough food to last three months."

Something dawned on him suddenly. "How is the electricity still on? If you're right, this place hasn't been used in years."

Oujou smiled wanly, the first even hint of a smile either of them had shown in a while. "I checked this right before I got moved to Gakuen Alice. My parents set up an account with quite a bit of money for electricity for this place. I guess they were expecting to die."

Satsuto opened his mouth to say something, but stopped at the sound of a clang. They both stiffened, but then Oujou muttered, "Sniper." Satsuto nodded.

Oujou glanced speculatively to the side, towards a darkened area of the room, closing her eyes and cocking her head as if listening to something far away, but then she looked back at the computer screen.

"How many Academies are there?" she asked suddenly.

Satsuto bit his lip, counting in his head. "Four," he answered finally. "A fifth is being built as we speak in Germany, but that shouldn't be done for another few years."

Oujou nodded; the current four were in Britain, America, France, and Japan. They were all in powerful countries, but all were too far away to be of any use at a moment's notice. Not helpful for a war. It would be good if they could get help from an outside source, but not enough people knew about alices to be of any use, and those who did know either wouldn't want to help or wouldn't be able to.

She sighed, and Satsuto looked over at her, his eyes curious. She shook her head, closing her eyes and shifting to a more comfortable position. Satsuto stood up and touched her shoulder lightly. "Take my chair."

Rolling her eyes, Oujou said, "Aw, that's sweet, but I don't need it. I would rather stand. Anyway—" She broke off as Satsuto pushed her gently down into the chair and dragged over another chair for himself. "Fine," she muttered. "I'll sit."

And then she smiled slightly and shifted her hand to her pocket, partially pulling out the gun concealed there. Her body was completely still, and she gave no sign of any tension.

When she spoke, her voice was mirrored by another. "What are you doing here?"

**--**

**_That was my last post for three weeks. Hopefully when I get back from nerd camp (which is where I'm going), I'll be able to post a lot, but don't count on it. Anyway, hope to hear from you then. In the meantime, please review. Thank you._**


	24. Not What It Seems

_**I'm really sorry that that took so long. This took me a **_**really**_** long time to write. The next two chapters should be better (or at least review more), but for now, I hope you enjoy.**_

_--_

_The world is dyed with the color of blood. It will never be able to go back to the way it was before.  
-Vampire Knight_

_When she spoke, her voice was mirrored by another. "What are you doing here?"_

Satstuto swore, turning his head to face the woman standing in the shadows with her gun pointed at them; his hand flew to his pocket. In stark contrast, Oujou was smiling, her sleek black gun pointed at the woman, who was moving her gun slowly between Oujou and Satsuto.

"I asked you a question."

Oujou raised an eyebrow. "So did I."

The woman cocked her head to the side, seeming to contemplate her next move as she stare unwaveringly at the two teenagers. "My name is Mikaru Hisami." Satsuto's eyes involuntarily twitched to the computer screen, and the woman frowned slightly.

"How did you get in here?" Oujou demanded.

The woman instead responded by saying, "I gave my name. It's common courtesy to give yours in response."

Oujou's smile stayed in place, but her eyes tightened. "That may be true, but neither of us are worried about common courtesy right now, are we?"

"I suppose not. Now, _put the gun down._" Oujou blinked, staring at the woman, her smile increasing a notch. Satsuto, on the other hand, twitched, trying to put down a gun that was still in his pocket.

"That isn't going to work on me," Oujou told her calmly. "I have taken more of that anti-pheromone crap than you can ever imagine."

Mikaru Hisami, without releasing her gun, reached up with one hand and carefully pulled off her left earring, an amethyst stud. "_PUT THE GUN DOWN!_" she shouted, her voice eerily compelling despite the obvious threat in it. Oujou's arm shook, but her only other reaction was to swear and steady the arm holding the gun with her other arm.

Grimacing, Mikaru quickly shifted her focus to Satsuto, saying, "If you don't put your gun down, I'll shoot him." Oujou frowned, then stood up and, balancing on only one crutch so she could continue to aim the gun at Mikaru, walked in front of Satsuto, shielding him. "_Move._"

Oujou's hand twitched.

"_MOVE!_" Mikaru ordered once more.

Oujou's hand twitched.

Mikaru grimaced, playing with her earring in her free hand. "I don't get it," she muttered to herself. "How is she not following it?"

Grinning once more, Oujou said, "I am following your instruction. You told me to move. I moved."

"If that's how you want to do it, then I'll shoot _you_ instead."

Oujou shook her head, her expression amused. "No, you won't."

"I have no reason not to."

"But you won't. You want me alive so I can answer your questions."

"I can just ask him," Mikaru countered.

"But you haven't been. If you wanted a straight answer, you would have asked him. But you've only been asking me questions. Because you're afraid of me. I'm a threat."

Mikaru's eyes widened, the whites showing around her golden-brown irises. Then she deliberately relaxed, letting out a breath. "You don't know what you're talking about."

Oujou raised an eyebrow. "Oujou Kanjouinyuu. Daughter of Oujou Hiruka and Oujou Kisuke. Gakuen Alice. You are afraid of me." Mikaru swore, her gun lowering half an inch.

"You have Nullification, don't you? Just like your mother. That's how you could resist me."

Shaking her head, Oujou frowned. "No. I told you: I've had a ton of that anti-pheromone stuff. I'm going to ask you again: what are you doing here?"

Mikaru looked resigned: she sighed and lowered her gun another inch. "I have something to show you." Headmaster Satsuto began to stand up. "No, not you, Headmaster-san."

Both Oujou and Satsuto stiffened, and then Oujou told Mikaru, "I'm not going in there without him." She frowned thoughtfully. "By the way, how do you manage to hide so many emotions? Because I'm assuming it isn't just you in here, and you, at least, don't have an emotion controller."

Mikaru sighed once again. "Come on, I'll show you." Grinning, she noted Satsuto's stare, which was turning murderous. "You too, I guess, Headmaster-san. But you aren't leaving my sight."

Mikaru turned and began walking deeper into the shadows, but Satsuto waited for Oujou to grab her crutches before following. Oujou didn't pocket her gun.

"You're afraid of me, too," Oujou remarked quietly as they walked. Satsuto frowned.

"What?"

Biting her lower lip until it was white, Oujou looked down, not meeting his eye. "You've seen what I am, what I can do, just a little, and you're afraid of me. What are you going to do when you see just how strong I am?"

"It doesn't matter." His voice was terse, clipped.

"Yes, it does." She grinned suddenly, but it faded almost as soon as it came. "How am I supposed to protect you if you run away screaming?"

Satsuto shook his head, staring pointedly at the ground. "You're not."

Oujou opened her mouth—obviously in protest—but she was interrupted by Mikaru, who had come to stop in front of what looked like a gateway—the outside part was made up of two black, metal posts connected at ceiling height by a rounded section attached to each vertical pole by a large, pearly pink orb. Each section was ordained in ornate iron vines; there was a palpable energy around the gate and inside it. Bright blue sparks jumped between the two side posts. Nothing but a faint gray fog was visible past it, but Oujou guessed that there were people beyond it.

"We need to go through here. I have to warn you, it may feel weird, especially if you have on multiple alice control devices, but it'll only last for a second." Satsuto and Oujou took a step towards it at the same time, and they passed through the gate simultaneously.

Searing pain hit Oujou on the head like a sledgehammer, and then everything turned red and tilted on the strangest angle.

Black.

**--**

_**Hint: If you're confused about their reaction to the lady, check the last chapter.**_

_**Hopefully I'll be able to post again soon. I have part of the next chapter written already, but I'm in a play in just about a week, so I don't really know what's going to happen.**_


	25. Alice Forever

_**Well, hi there. Here's the next chapter. After this, I'm going away for about a week (I think), and I'll miss all of my readers (if there are any). Anyway, hope you enjoy.**_

_--_

_To see a world in a grain of sand  
And a heaven in a wild flower,  
Hold infinity in the palm of your hand  
And eternity in an hour._

_--William Blake_

_Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep._

Shrill, rhythmic beeps pierced through Oujou's cloudy thoughts, and she groaned, prying her heavy eyes open. There was a small gasp from beside her and she turned her head as best as she could, staring at the person next to her. People, actually. Not person.

Satsuto.

And Mikaru Hisami.

"You're awake. That's good." Oujou blinked at the sound of Mikaru's voice, then fidgeted, trying to sit up. Mikaru and Satsuto simultaneously pushed down on her shoulder with their hands, holding her down; she leaned back down with a gasp.

"What happened?" she asked, resting her head on the pillow and turning towards Mikaru and Satsuto.

Mikaru's lips twitched into what could be perceived as a smile. "I was about to ask you the same thing. Is there something wrong with your body? You have injuries; did they have anything to do with this?"

Satsuto frowned thoughtfully, waiting for Oujou's answer. His eyes bore into hers, and she flinched away slightly, involuntarily. He grimaced at that and looked down, sorrow momentarily flooding his expression.

Finally, she answered, "I think it was my alice."

"What?"

Oujou sighed. "I have the unlimited alice type and four alice control devices on. Just the shock of them turning off overloaded my system." Satsuto looked up at her with wide, horrified eyes, then looked away again, his expression guilty. Oujou realized he was thinking about the first time he had met her, when he took off her control device. "It's gotten worse since I came to the Academy, although it's been getting worse progressively throughout the years."

Mikaru frowned. "But you weren't using your alice." Then, as an afterthought, she added, "Were you?"

"I have empathy," she gave as way as an explanation. Mikaru's eyes widened.

"You have empathy…. That's how you knew that I didn't have on an emotion controller." And then she froze. "What _are_ you doing here, anyway? You never told me that."

Satsuto took over at this point. "It was sort of an accident. Oujou-san got the highest score on the exam, so she was permitted to leave school for a week. I am her…escort. We were attacked by a sniper and we came in here for protection."

Mikaru's brow furrowed in confusion. "Why did you come _here_?"

"This was my parents'," was Oujou's answer. She closed her eyes again, sighing heavily.

"You were telling the truth," Mikaru murmured to herself, pulling her hand through her hair.

"Of course," Satsuto muttered under his breath. Oujou smiled slightly, opening her eyes again. She glanced towards Mikaru and Satsuto.

She opened her mouth to speak, but was distracted by another thought. Did they have any other control devices that they could use? "Do you happen to have any unused control devices?" Mikaru frowned, thinking, but then she shook her head, looking sorry. "Okay. Whatever. Can I leave now?"

Mikaru looked horrified at the question, while Satsuto merely looked unsurprised and slightly frustrated. "Of course not," Mikaru exclaimed. "You're still weak. We may not like the Academy, but we're not monsters." Oujou made a face; Satsuto snickered.

"You're not getting out of it that easily this time," he muttered.

Mikaru stared at the two of them for a moment, trying to understand the exchange between them, before asking, "What are you talking about?"

Satsuto smirked at Oujou before answering, "She refuses to stay in the infirmary whenever she gets injured. It's about time that she doesn't have a choice."

Oujou glared at Satsuto before being struck by a completely random question: how many people were in this group. Concentrating, she thrust out her powers, sifting through each and every emotion in the huge underground area, counting them.

247.

There were 247 people in the group. That was enough to help the Academy fend off the AAO and possibly even get back the students that were captured.

"Azumi Yuka sends her regards." Mikaru and Satsuto stiffened and both turned simultaneously to stare wide-eyed at Oujou. Oujou was lying, but they didn't need to know that. This was her way of finding out information—that just told her that they both knew Yuka. Knew or had heard of her.

"How do you know Azumi Yuka?" Satsuto whispered, his voice tight and strained.

Oujou smiled wryly, please at how this was going. "She kept me from being taken into the AAO when my parents died. Every month she visited me at the orphanage, and she always gave me presents on my birthday. She even gave me my first control device."

Satsuto's eyes widened even further, until it looked like they were going to pop out of his head. "She kept you out of the AAO? Why…? Isn't she part of the AAO?"

"Yeah, but she's _not a monster_ either." They both flinched at Oujou's harsh tone.

Oujou closed her eyes, and her heart rate, which had picked up speed slightly at her last sentence, slowly back down. She took a deep breath, then began coughing loudly, her hand clutched to her mouth in an attempt to stifle the noise. Satsuto and Mikaru both jumped to their feet; Satsuto touched Oujou's forehead, then gasped. It was burning.

Blood splattered onto her hand by her mouth and past it, onto the sheets. Oujou swore under her breath, her other hand flying up as well to cover her mouth. More blood flew out of her mouth, coating her hands in gore. Mikaru and Satsuto simultaneously opened their mouths to say something, but she stopped them.

"Wait," she rasped out between spasms out coughs. "Just…wait a minute…. I'm…fine."

They both froze, and she took a deep, shuddering breath, pressing one blood-covered hand to her throat, leaving a spattered streak of red on her pale skin. "I'm sorry," she gasped, one final cough escaping from her mouth—sans the blood.

"What happened?" Mikaru demanded.

"My body can't take the pressure much longer. I'm not going to make it out of this was alive."

--

**_And so, I leave you with that. I won't have access to computers for a week, but after that I'll post as soon as I finish the next chapter. Now, I have to go pack. Talk to you later. Bye._**

**_P.S. Please review. I almost forgot that._**


	26. Hypnosis

_**I know, there were a few typos last chapter. If I took a while to post, I'm sorry. Anyway, please enjoy.**_

_--_

"_Now I am become Death, the destroyer of worlds."_

_-Bhagavad Gita_

"_My body can't take the pressure much longer. I'm not going to make it out of this war alive."_

Mikaru and Satsuto stared at her in silence for a moment; then Mikaru laughed nervously and admonished, "Don't you think you're being a little…over dramatic?"

Oujou looked down at her hands, pale and covered in sticky, warm blood. "No. I can't turn my alice off, and I don't have anything that would slow the process of cell degeneration. I'm dying, and faster than you can imagine. That's why I need to get out of here. I'm useless here, useless and dying."

Satsuto frowned, closing his eyes and running a hand through his hair. "Please just wait. You're too weak to do much good right now."

Mikaru cleared her throat. "Actually…there's something you have to do." Oujou frowned.

"What is it?"

"You need to submit for questioning."

Oujou sighed. "Fine." Mikaru nodded, seeming pleased at Oujou's compliance, and offered her a hand. Oujou shook her head and opted to climb out of bed on her own, reaching for the crutches leaning against the wall next to her. Satsuto began to protest, but both Mikaru and Oujou shook him off. Sighing in defeat, he followed the two off them down a series of long passageways.

People they passed eyed them with a mixture of curiosity, disgust and hope—was it hope, Oujou wondered, that they had been captured, or that the Academy had given up.

Finally, the three of them reached a doorway at the end of the third passageway. Mikaru knocked and a female, smooth voice called them in. As Oujou stepped inside, she froze, Satsuto automatically freezing behind her.

The person in front of her had long, slightly spiky black hair, was wearing a long black overcoat, had on multiple earrings and bracelets, and was wearing a simple white marks over much of the top of her face. In other words, they looked nearly identical to Persona. In fact, they would have been identical to Persona if it weren't for the black flower reminiscent of the symbol of Squad Six of the Gotei 13 from Bleach on her cheek; Persona's control device was a red cross.

"I supposed I shouldn't be surprised," the person said softly; her voice was definitely female. "Serio's still leading the Dangerous Ability group, isn't he?"

Oujou stared at the woman for a moment, completely silent. After a moment, the woman chuckled, saying, "I guess you know him as Persona." Oujou nodded, answering her previous question. "Ah, yes. Well, your response was natural. I do resemble my brother, don't I?"

Oujou slumped against the wall, letting Satsuto step around her; she was still taking in what she had just heard.

The woman began again. "My name is Sakiro. I am Serio's—Persona's—twin sister, and the leader of this facility." She turned to Satsuto. "What an odd surprise, having the headmaster here. Is Sakura-san's brother this there?"

Oujou stiffened, staring at Satsuto in confusion. He smiled at her, answering her unasked question. "Sakura Mikan's father's brother works at the Academy. He's the High School Principal." (A/N I didn't make that up. Read Chapter 100 of Gakuen Alice.)

"What do you want with me?" Oujou asked, drawing the conversation back to the original idea.

Sakiro smiled fondly, like an aunt would to a favorite niece. "We need to make sure you're not here on the Academy's orders."

"So what, you can put me in a nice, dark cell?"

Sakiro looked horrified at the idea. "No, of course not."

"What if I'm here to kill you?"

"Then we put you in a nice, dark cell. But instead of thinking like that, why don't we just start this. You can go sit down on the chair over there." Sakiro pointed to a comfortable-looking armchair against the wall opposite her desk. Oujou nodded and walked over, sitting down and leaning her crutches against the wall beside her.

Sakiro stood in front of Oujou as Satsuto walked beside his friend and placed a hand on her shoulder. Black bore into black and Sakiro stared into Oujou's eyes; after a moment, Oujou's went blank and her breathing relaxed into a slow, steady rhythm.

Sakiro began questioning immediately. "Do you have connections to Gakuen Alice?"

"Yes." Oujou's voice was flat and lifeless, a gray monotone.

"Do you have connections to the AAO?"

"Yes."

"Do you have connections to this organization?"

"Indirectly."

"Why did you come here?"

"This was the closest safe-house that I knew about. We were under sniper fire." Oujou's finger twitched, and Satsuto flinched, unsure if she was breaking free from the hypnosis or if there was some other reason for her sudden, spastic movement.

"Who was firing?"

"I do not know."

Sakiro sighed and shifted her weight from her left to her right leg, using one hand to brush a lock of hair away from her face. "What is your connection to this place?"

Oujou's voice was still completely calm, emotionless, but she twitched again, her hand opening in one jolty motion. "This was where my parents brought me. It was their safe-house."

"What happened the night your parents died?" Sakiro's voice became surprisingly soft and gentle, despite the fact that there was no need to try to coax the answer out of her—Oujou would give the same response whether Sakiro did that or screamed it at her.

Oujou's hands clenched into fists—her entire body locked down and her mouth opened as though she was trying to scream, though no sound came out.

And then a heart-wrenching shriek rang through the air.

"_HELP ME!"_

_--_

**_How was it? Please review. Anyway, I'll post again as soon as I can, but school has started so I'm not sure when that'll be._**


	27. Fire, Fire, Burning Down

_**Stupid PSAT tomorrow. I mean, I'm only in eighth grade. Anyway, I'm sorry I took so long. That was a case of really bad writer's block. Anyway, Hope you enjoy.**_

_--_

_"Footfalls echo in the memory  
Down the passage which we did not take  
Towards the door we never opened into the rose-garden.  
—T.S. Eliot_

Oujou smiled as she ran up to her parents, hugging her mother and grabbing her father's hand. He leaned down and kissed her on the cheek, letting her tousle his dark hair.

"Hi, Okaa-san, Otou-san." Hiruka and Kisuke Oujou grinned at their daughter as she patted her younger sister on the head. "Hi, Tsuki-chan."

Tsuki nodded cheerfully to her older sister, before frowning and turning her head to the side as though listening to something far away. "Do you smell smoke?" she asked, her soft voice confused. Kisuke, Hiruka, and Oujou all sniffed at the same time, then frowned at each other.

"I smell that too," Hiruka murmured, more to herself than to her family. Then, in one suddenly, jolty movement, she pulled Oujou and Tsuki down to the ground; Kisuke ducked as the window behind them exploded in a burst of fire. Shards of glass flew everywhere, sprinkling in all of their hair. Tsuki shrieked, her voice loud, high-pitched, too young to be considered shrill.

Oujou tried to stand up, to look around to see what was going on, but her Kisuke shoved her back down, hissing, "Stay low to the ground and start crawling towards the door." Oujou nodded and obeyed his command, shuffling across the ground towards the door. Another window shattered and Tsuki screamed, clutching to her mother's hand.

"What's going on?" Oujou demanded in her calm, six-year-old voice, her demeanor surprisingly composed considering the circumstances.

Kisuke glanced at his wife, then back at his oldest daughter. "There's a fire." Oujou nodded again, continuing to crawl towards the door. She shoved it open wider and began to crawl through, then gave a small gasp of surprise when the ceiling caught fire and smoke began pouring into the room. Turning left, she reached the stairs.

"Run!" Hiruka shrieked. Oujou stood, racing down the stairs, holding one hand over her mouth to keep from inhaling the smoke.

There was a crack, loud, like a think piece of wood snapping, and then a gigantic crash as a huge beam of wood smashed through the wall, blocking the stairwell between Oujou and the rest of her family. Burning, orange-red embers flew into the air, settling anywhere and everywhere, leaving and burns and blisters where they touched skin.

Oujou spun around immediately, one burned hand pressed up to her mouth and nose, the other reaching outstretched towards the only family she had.

"Go!" Hiruka screamed, her voice cutting off abruptly in a fit of coughing. "Go! Go! Get out of the building!" Oujou froze for one long second, the gears in her mind turning furiously, and then she spun around and raced to the door, shoving it open and running out into the evening air.

The entire world was on fire.

Embers were flying everywhere, charring where they fell, people coughing, everything shifting in a terrifying whirl of color and sound and motion.

Oujou doubled over, her hand clutched to her stomach, coughing, black-gray soot staining the hand pressed over her mouth. Staggering, she backed up against a tree and collapsed against it, alternately panting and coughing.

Helpless, exhausted, she watched as flames engulfed the village, everything catching fire, everything burning down. Coughs erupted from her sore throat, the smoldering embers coating her with black ash. It was like snow, deadly, burning snow falling down from the heavens, covering the ground, the trees, everything.

Her eyes focused on her house. There was movement, some shifting beyond the flames that had enveloped the building. She strained to see what it was through the smoke and the flames and the drifting ash.

There was a loud crash, and Oujou's eyes flung to the source of the noise. A boy from the village, familiar, with raven-black hair and eyes the color of fire ran past her, tears streaking down his dirty face. Fire followed his every footstep, dying out as quickly as it came.

Oujou's eyes followed him as he raced across the flaming ground, and then she lurched to her feet, stumbling towards her house. The vague images she could see though the haze of the fire and the smoke and the heat were becoming clearer, sharper, and they looked like people now, their silhouettes distorted.

Two.

There were two silhouettes.

Both were adult.

Oujou began to run back towards the house, coughing and panting from the smoke burning her singed throat. A sudden gust of wind blew the flames closer towards her, and she flinched as a lick of fire came a foot from her face.

The people burst through the curtain of fire. Her parents.

"Otou-san," Oujou cried, watching as they ran towards her. "Okaa-san." Her voice faltered for a moment, the name getting stuck in her throat. "Tsuki?" It was a mere whisper, but her parents both looked down at the small body in Kisuke's arms as though they had heard.

They stopped in front of Oujou, both panting, and Kisuke laid his youngest daughter softly on the ground.

The entire world was on fire.

Her touched her burnt face and closed his eyes, concentrated, blood trickling down his face from the laceration his right cheek.

The entire world was on fire.

The small girl before her didn't stir, as ash drifted onto her face and shadows danced across the air.

The entire world was on fire.

"Shit," Kisuke muttered to himself, clenching his teeth and hitting the ground beside Tsuki's head.

The entire world was on fire.

Hiruka looked at her eldest daughter, who was staring at the small girl so dear to her lying on the ground, pale as the summer sun.

The entire world was on fire.

"She's gone, isn't she?" Oujou whispered, tears running down her soot-covering cheeks unbidden, unnoticed.

The entire world was on fire.

Hiruka nodded, placing a hand on Oujou's shoulder, and the two watched as Kisuke cried over the body of his newest daughter.

The entire world was on fire.

Mother daughter stood, and together they felt the echo of their emotions reverberating between each other, growing louder.

The entire world was on fire.

Oujou knelt beside the body of her sister, already growing cold, barely feeling the warmth of her mother's hand still resting on her shoulder.

The entire world was on fire.

Her father collapsed on the ground, the tears still running down his cheeks, as Oujou felt the sorrow tearing away at her heart increasing, growing exponentially.

The entire world was on fire.

"Tsuki," she whispered over and over until the word lost meaning on her tongue, but still she said it, still she no longer heard the word, but only the sound.

The entire world was on fire.

Hiruka fell to her knees beside her daughter, gasping for breath, pale behind the burns across her beautiful face.

The entire world was on fire.

She smiled at Oujou as she slowly fell to the ground, supporting herself on hands and knees.

The entire world was on fire.

"Kanjouinyuu-chan, you power is strong, to strong for even my Nullification to stop. Don't worry. We are happy."

The entire world was on fire.

The words grew fainter from her mouth now as she strained for breath."We had a good life and we know that you are safe. But promise that you will never willingly hurt someone with this. God did not give you this power to hurt."

The entire world was on fire.

Oujou stared at her mother, as she felt the life slipping from her body. "I promise, Okaa-san," she whispered. "I promise."

The entire world was on fire.

And then they slipped away.

The entire world was on fire.

A hand touched her shoulder, and then the entire world shattered like a mirror, everything fragmented into a million pieces. Oujou closed her eyes and sobbed.

_--_

_**Hope you liked it. Please read and review. Bye now. Oh, I probably won't post in November. Warning you in advanced.**_


	28. Days Go By

_**God, that took me too long. I really wish I had been able to post this—I had actually written about half of this before—but I didn't get to. Sorry. Anyway, I hope you enjoy it.**_

_--_

"_He liked to observe emotions; they were like red lanterns strung along the dark unknown of another's personality, marking vulnerable points."_

_-Ayn Rand_

Satsuto had watched helplessly as Oujou had screamed, had begun shaking, her mouth moving soundlessly. Now she sobbed against his chest, her eyes pressed tightly closed, sharp, pained gasps coming from her mouth.

Carefully, like she was a cracked piece of glass about to shatter at any second, he wound his arms around her, conscious of Sakiro's gaze boring into the two of them. Oujou whimpered, then raised her head slowly, her bloodshot eyes meeting Satsuto's through a tangle of her jet-black hair.

"I'm sorry," she whispered, her voice cracking. She looked so much younger, and yet so much older, with her guard down and her emotions allowed free.

Satsuto shook his head, stroking her hair lightly. "Don't apologize," he murmured. He tried to keep his emotions under control, his pity, his sorrow, to alleviate her burden even just a little. But it was difficult, and he knew he was fighting a losing battle.

Sakiro stepped forward towards them now, her expression carefully blank. "I do owe you an apology, however. I had no idea this would happen. I am truly sorry." Oujou nodded, a bit absentminded, almost like her mind had slipped away to the back of her head and she was acting purely on impulse, and on what her body remembered she was supposed to do.

She had retreated back inside herself.

"Days pass by," she began, her low voice halting. "Months pass by, years pass by. Time goes on. How? How can time pass, how can time still go on when you're already dead?" She paused, and they stared at her, stunned and speechless.

"How?"

She touched the corner of her mouth, and her lips parted just a little. She raised her head, moving out of Satsuto's grasp and back into the chair, slumping back. Satsuto moved his hand to touch her cheek, but she moved back infinitesimally, away from his fingers.

There was a knock on the door, and Sakiro and Satsuto jumped; Oujou didn't move, rather just staring blankly ahead.

Sakiro cleared herself, straightened her shirt out, and called, "Come in."

The door swung open, and a boy around Satsuto's age walked in, his icy blue eyes seeming to take in everything of the room at once. And then he turned to Sakiro. "There's a sniper firing at the hatch, and a few of the bullets almost broke through. The security team is wondering what to do."

Although he had flawless Japanese, a hint of a British accent colored his words. Satsuto turned around to stare at him for a second, then returned his gaze to Oujou.

Sakiro glanced over at Oujou and Satsuto for a moment. "Are you t—would you mind if I left for a little while?" Satsuto opened his mouth to answer, but instead Oujou stood up, walking around Satsuto to where Sakiro was standing.

"Imota-san, you can come as well." Satsuto stood up slowly, turning to face Sakiro.

"My father was Imota Samori. I don't use that name." Bowing his head stiffly, Satsuto headed over to Oujou and placed a hand on her shoulder. She flinched away from it.

"Forgive me. Well, shall we go?" The four of them headed out the door, and down the well-lit hallway; Sakiro led the way, and the blond, blue-eyed boy followed behind.

Satsuto turned his head to face the boy. "We're not going to attack you. You should know that."

The boy grinned and walked up next to Satsuto, who adjusted his body again to face him. "Oh, I know." He glanced at Oujou, and his eyes went blank for a moment. "Your girlfriend has issues."

"She can hear, you know," Satsuto hissed, his eyes darting back to Oujou for a second. She hadn't reacted.

The boy's expression grew serious. "She can hear, but she isn't listening." Satsuto looked like he wanted to respond, but he didn't get a chance. At that moment, they walked into the main cavern where they had come in from—the anti-alice shield seemed to be off at that point, so Oujou didn't even flinch passing through the door—and they came to a halt.

The metal on the top-right of the curved wall was closed, with dents all over it, all of them new, and more were coming, along with the sound of gunshots. A woman, looking harassed, walked over to the four of them.

"A sniper's firing at the door, but we can't kill him without either opening the door or killing anybody that may be on the other side of the door, which we can't risk." Sakiro bit her lip, thinking, but while she did that, Oujou walked up to the door, silently raising her arm to point her hand at it. The gunshots and denting slowed, then stopped altogether, and there was a thump from the other side of the door.

Oujou turned to look back at the group; everybody was staring at her. "Now he's dead," she mumbled, and then pressed her hand against a circuit on the wall. The lights flickered, then brightened again.

"What just happened?" Samori demanded, staring at Oujou, then Satsuto, then even the boy, who stepped forward to answer.

He told her, "Oujou-san killed the sniper by sensing his emotions and then draining all of his life force."

Satsuto stared at the boy. "Who are you? How do you know that?"

The boy turned his bright blue eyes on the headmaster, who stared back stubbornly. "My name is Jason Evans, and my Alices are _Knowledge_ and _Control_."

For a moment, Satsuto just stared at him, but finally, he asked the question that he had been beating at his mind. "What Alices are those?"

Jason grinned. "This may not be the best place to tell you." He began to walk back towards the doorway, and Oujou and Satsuto followed close behind him. When they reached a door off of one of the hallways, Jason opened it and showed them in, switching on the light and closing the door behind him.

Inside was a neatly made bed, a desk, a dresser, two chairs, and not much else. The room looked bare, empty of all personal items—at least in sight.

"This is my room," Jason told them. "You can take a seat if you want." And then he turned and touched Oujou on the forehead with the fingertips of his right hand; Oujou froze, not even flinching away from his touch.

"Damn," he muttered, in English this time, his British accent more pronounced now. "What the hell did she do to her head?"

Satsuto took a step towards him, and Jason's head turned, his eyes blank and unseeing, the movement purely instinctive. "What are you doing to her?" Satsuto demanded.

Jason turned to look back at Oujou. "I'm trying to help her. Her mind—it's shut off from almost everything, and her Alice—her empathy—is going into overdrive. For one, her body can't handle it, and for two, her mind can't handle it, and for three, she needs to hear what's going on."

With that, he closed his eyes; Oujou's entire body twitched, then began to spasm violently, although she somehow regained on her feet. Jason grabbed her shoulders, holding her steady, shaking his head when Satsuto reached out to steady her as well.

Oujou finally stopped shaking, and just stood still, her eyes closed, her face completely blank. Jason touched one hand to her face, keeping the other hand on her shoulder, and gently asked, "Can you hear me?"

"Yes," Oujou replied softly, her eyes remaining closed.

Jason nodded, more to himself than her, it seemed, seeing as she couldn't see him, and then he spoke again. "Why don't you sit down?" Without waiting for a response, he carefully led her over to one of the chairs and pushed her down into it, removing his hands from her.

Slowly, she opened her eyes, staring at him. "How do you feel?" he asked her gently, staring her in the eye, bending down so their faces were level.

Oujou blinked a few times before answering. "I'm fine…I guess. What happened?"

Jason shook his head. "I don't have time to answer that right now. I'm not sure how long this is going to last, and I need to explain something to you before you…go back to how you were."

"What is it?" Oujou asked.

"You need to hear who I am."

--

_**Hope to post again soon. Not sure if I will be able to. Please review. Thanks.**_


	29. Jason Evans

_**Well, happy holidays, for all of you that celebrate holidays in this time of the year. Here's the new chapter (duh), and I hope you enjoy.**_

_--_

_Information is power. But it is what you do with it that either makes you great or diminishes you._

"Who you…are…." Oujou repeated slowly, her eyes confused.

Jason nodded, grinning a little sheepishly. "Well, not just who _I_ am, but, …well, a lot of things. I have to begin now; like I said, I don't know how long this'll last.

"My name is Jason Evans. A little over a year ago, the Academy—Alice Academy—tried to kill me. They nearly succeeded, but I got away with only a bullet in my arm. I was too dangerous—too strong and unsubmissive. I am one of the most powerful Alice-users ever, and the only one with my Alices. My two Alices are _Control_ and _Knowledge_." He paused. "Those two Alices coexist and would not work well without each other.

"_Knowledge_ grants me the ability to know everything about a person or object by simply seeing in. For objects, even just seeing a photograph will let me know about that thing, but for humans, I must see them in person. I can tell, in layman's terms, the person's entire history, everything that they have ever done or thought, if I want to. Now, generally, I don't.

"_Control_ grants me the ability to warp reality, to an extent. I cannot change anything that has already come to pass. I can, however, change a person's perspective of what has come to pass, or their memories. I can change physical objects, also, to an extent. I cannot change a person's DNA, or their body, but I can change words on a page, or the color of the sky."

Jason paused, noticing Oujou kneading her forehead with the heel of her palm. "Are you alright?" he asked her, leaning down towards her.

"I'm fine," she answered. "You need to continue your story, right?"

Nodding, Jason leaned against the wall beside Oujou's seat, crossing his arms across his chest. "Yeah, you're right. This organization has existed for the past ten years, with two purposes. The first is to house those who have escaped the Academy. The second is to gain enough members to eventually take down both the Academy and the AAO.

"The list of those that were killed—or supposed to be killed—that you saw is only a partial list. There are more lists in other documents. Those were only the dangerous ones. Others were killed for other reasons. One such example is of those who have become close to the dangerous ones."

Satsuto frowned. "Why was Sakura Mikan on the dangerous list, then?"

"Sakura Mikan is one of the most dangerous Alice-users ever. She in incompliant, reckless, stupid, and has the ability to steal the Alice of anybody that she wants. Think of what she could do with, say, my alice." Satsuto shuddered at the thought. "Exactly. Now, from what I understand, a war is soon to begin between the Academies and the AAO. We can help each other."

It was Oujou who spoke now. "I was considering that earlier, but with what you've told us now, that doesn't make sense. If you want to destroy us, you won't be a very valuable asset when helping us."

"That may be true," Jason admitted, "but the Academies alone cannot defeat the AAO—not without being dealt heavy casualties. We want to stop the loss of innocent lives over all else."

In the short lull of conversation, Oujou began to stand up, and—a phone rang. Startled, Satsuto jumped, and Oujou sank back into her chair, while Jason took a step towards the young headmaster. When Satsuto's hand moved to his pocket, Jason spoke. "Don't answer it."

Satsuto blinked in confusion. "Why not?"

"It'll track the call," Jason hissed. "We can't reveal this position to anyone."

The phone rang again, and Satsuto grimaced. "They'll wonder why I didn't answer the phone."

"Let them wonder," Jason answered. "That's not our problem. However, it is our problem if they find out where we are. Truth be told, you shouldn't even know, Headmaster-san."

Oujou raised an eyebrow, and Jason looked at her. "But I should?" she asked, her voice a little sardonic.

Jason shrugged. "Truthfully, there's no real reason you shouldn't. Technically, you own this place. And it's not like you can't keep a secret."

Stasuto looked as though he wanted to ask about that statement, but he didn't, grimacing again when the phone rang. Jason looked back at him, then ran a hand through his hair and leaned back against the wall.

Oujou frowned and rubbed her forehead again, her breathing coming heavier. "Put it on," she mumbled into her hands, her voice sounding hoarse and choked.

Satsuto blinked. "What?"

"Put it on," Oujou repeated. "Put on your emotion blocker. Please." She gasped, and Jason knelt down beside her, his eyes worried.

"She can't handle this." He turned to face Satsuto, rotating on one foot, and said, "Do what she said. Put the emotion blocker on. It'll help."

Satsuto stuck his hand in his pocket and, fumbling around for a moment, pulled out the emotion blocker and stuck it on his neck, right below his ear. Oujou let out a huge breath, then closed her eyes. "Thank you," she murmured, pressing her hands against her eyelids.

Jason touched her chin with one surprisingly cold finger. "Look at me," he ordered.

"No," Oujou mumbled in response.

Using one hand, Jason pried both of her hands off of her face, then staring her in the eye as she opened her eyes, then blinked a few times. His expression grew vacant, and after a moment, so did hers. A minute later, both of them blinked in unison, and Oujou pulled away sharply.

"Damn," she muttered. "Don't do that."

Jason shrugged and stood up, stretching. "I had to. Something about this place is messing with your Alice, and that coupled with what Sakiro-san did to you earlier is really messing you up."

Oujou let out a deep breath. "Memories," she muttered.

"What?" Satsuto asked sharply, and they both looked at him.

"The reason that I'm—messed up, as he put it, is that the memories in this place are really strong for me. This was where I stayed with my parents sometimes. And 'what Sakiro-san did to me' only served to strengthen those memories. My Alice overreacting is only a byproduct. It's my mind trying to find a way to deal with it."

Shuddering, she took a deep breath, then let it out slowly. "I don't want your pity," she said suddenly, and Jason coughed, as though he was hiding a laugh.

"Am I to assume my emotion controller isn't working?" Satsuto asked, and reached for the object on his neck.

Oujou shook her head. "No. It's working fine. It's just to keep the amount I sense at a normal level. It was getting out of control."

Satsuto groaned, shifting in his chair. A second later, his phone rang again, and Jason swore under his breath, running a hand though his hair again.

"You're not answering," he told Satsuto, who let out a hiss of annoyance. Jason let his eyes close for a few seconds, and the ringing stopped. "It's off now.

"Really?" Satsuto's voice was sarcastic.

Jason ignored the remark and walked over to the desk, pulling out a few pieces of paper, which were paper-clipped together. "I think that you'll like this."

And then he handed the paper to Oujou. A small, almost happy smile lit up her face.

"Damn."

--

_**I'll post again before the end of the year. Please review. Thanks.**_


	30. Everywhere

**_Here's the next chapter. You don't have to read it, but I would advise at least skimming over it. Thanks._**

--

_They are everywhere. They are anywhere. They are the sun. They are the moon. They are the sight. They are never seen. They are hidden. They are always in plain sight. They are life. They are death._

Samantha Bentle  
-Muscle Control/Paralysis  
-American Alice Academy  
-Deceased  
--Too dangerous

Jonathan Masto  
-Healing  
-American Alice Academy  
-Deceased  
--Too dangerous

Mikaru Hisami  
-Voice Pheromone  
-Safehouse  
--Previously Japanese Gakuen Alice

Sakiro  
-Hypnosis  
-Safehouse

Serio  
-Death  
-Japanese Gakuen Alice

Rosa Marino  
-Alice Erase  
-Safehouse

Oujou Kisuke  
-Energy Transfer  
-Safehouse/On the run  
--Previously Japanese Gakuen Alice  
-Deceased

Oujou Hiruka  
-Empathy/Nullification  
-Safehouse/On the run  
--Previously Japanese Gakuen Alice  
-Deceased

Imota Samori  
-Sensory Depravation  
-Japanese Gakuen Alice  
-Deceased

Imota Satsuto  
-Borrow  
-Japanese Gakuen Alice

Hyuuga Natsume  
-Fire  
-Japanese Gakuen Alice

Sakura Mikan  
-Nullification/Steal  
-Japanese Gakuen Alice

Jacque Morel  
-Disease  
-French Académie d'Alice  
-Deceased  
--Too dangerous

Thomas Martin  
-Sense/Erase  
-French Académie d'Alice

Natsuko Yuki  
-Inhabitance  
-Japanese Gakuen Alice  
-Deceased  
--Too dangerous

Hitsugami Aya  
-Shapeshifter  
-Japanese Gakuen Alice  
-Deceased  
--Too dangerous

Samai Shinji  
-Molecular Separation  
-Japanese Gakuen Alice  
-Deceased  
--Too dangerous

Azumi Yuka  
-Teleportation/Steal  
-Anti-Alice Organization  
--Previously Japanese Gakuen Alice

Suzumi Kisumai  
-Invisibility  
-Japanese Gakuen Alice  
-Deceased  
--Too dangerous

Ninari Misa  
-Death Ruturn  
-On the Run  
--Previously Japanese Gakuen Alice

Yamamoto Takosamo  
-Metal Manipulation  
-Japanese Gakuen Alice  
-Deceased  
--Too dangerous

Tsuyoi Satsuto  
-Ice  
-Japanese Gakuen Alice  
-Deceased  
-Too dangerous

Imai Hotaru  
-Invention  
-Japanese Gakuen Alice

Nogi Ruka  
-Animal Pheromone  
-Japanese Gakuen Alice

Shouda Sumire  
-Cat and Dog Predisposition  
-Japanese Gakuen Alice

Tobita Yuu  
-Illusion  
-Japanese Gakuen Alice

Ogasawara Nonoko  
-Chemistry  
-Japanese Gakuen Alice

Umenomiya Anna  
-Cooking  
-Japanese Gakuen Alice

Kokoro Yomi  
-Telepathy  
-Japanese Gakuen Alice

Koizumi Luna  
-Soul Stealing  
-Japanese Gakuen Alice

Hijiri Youichi  
-Ghost Manipulation/Age Control  
Japanese Gakuen Alice

Otonashi Yura  
-Divination  
-Japanese Gakuen Alice

Andou Tsubasa  
-Shadow Manipulation  
-Japanese Gakuen Alice

Harada Misaki  
-Doppelganger  
-Japanese Gakuen Alice

Sonou Kaname  
-Soul Transfer  
-Japanese Gakuen Alice

Matsudaira Hayate  
-Air Control  
-Japanese Gakuen Alice

Ibaragi Nobara  
-Ice  
-Japanese Gakuen Alice

Miyazono Yuri  
-Female Pheromone  
-Japanese Gakuen Alice

Sakurano Shuuichi  
-Instant Teleportation/Intuition/Wish/Prayer  
-Japanese Gakuen Alice

Imai Subaru  
-Healing  
-Japanese Gakuen Alice

Amane Rui  
-Curse  
-Japanese Gakuen Alice

Yakumo Hajime  
-Insect Pheromone  
-Japanese Gakuen Alice

Tonouchi Akira  
-Amplification  
-Japanese Gakuen Alice

Yamanouchi Shizune  
-Sound  
-Japanese Gakuen Alice

Goshima Hijiri  
-Metamorphosis  
-Japanese Gakuen Alice

Narumi L. Anjo  
-Human Inclination Pheromone  
-Japanese Gakuen Alice

Misaki  
-Plant Manipulation  
-Japanese Gakuen Alice

Yamada Serina  
-Clairvoyance  
-Japanese Gakuen Alice

Noda  
-Time Travel  
-Japanese Gakuen Alice

Jinno  
-Lightning  
-Japanese Gakuen Alice

Fukutan  
-Hair  
-Japanese Gakuen Alice

Makihara  
-Instant Teleportation  
-Japanese Gakuen Alice

Yukihara Izumi  
-Nullification  
-Japanese Gakuen Alice  
-Deceased  
--Too dangerous

Kuonji  
-Sight  
-Japanese Gakuen Alice

Yukihara Kazu  
-Alice Detection/Longevity  
-Japanese Gakuen Alice

Reo Mouri  
-Voice Pheromone  
-Anti-Alice Organization  
--Previously Japanese Gakuen Alice

Shido  
-Barrier  
-Anti-Alice Organization  
--Previously Japanese Gakuen Alice

Shiki  
-Barrier/Teleportation/Explosion/Illusion  
-Anti-Alice Organization  
--Previously Japanese Gakuen Alice

Mihara  
-Stone  
-Anti-Alice Organization

--

_**This'll be explained in the next chapter. I hope this was informative and helpful. Please review. Thanks.**_


	31. God

_***Dodges flying spears.* I'm really, really sorry. I wanted to post this, like, two or three weeks ago, but I couldn't. I was busy. Just, I hope you enjoy (if anyone still reads), and again, I'm sorry.**_

_--_

_Kill one man and you are a murderer. Kill millions and you are a conqueror. Kill everyone and you are a God._

_-Jean Rostand_

Oujou blinked at the list for a moment. "Damn," she repeated. "I haven't even heard of some of these powers. What the hell is _Death Return_?"

A smile curled on Jason's lips as he took the paper out of her hand. "_Death Return_ is one of the alices commonly known as the God alices. _Death Return _allows the user to bring a person back to life, alice and all, but they are under her control. They will do whatever she instructs them to do."

Satsuto looked horrified; Oujou looked confused. "What the hell's a 'God alice"?"

Jason sighed and leaned against the wall once again, crossing his arms across his chest. "God alices are alices that give the user supposedly God-like abilities." Oujou raised an eyebrow at him, and he sighed again. "Yes, both _Knowledge_ and _Control_ are considered God alices. For each God alice, at most only one person has it at a time."

"What are the other ones?" Oujou demanded, and both she and Satsuto leaned forward where they were sitting, intrigued.

"There's _Death Return_, as I said, then…_Longevity_, which Sakura-san's brother has, then _Death_, which Serio has, as well as…_Sensory Control_, which is a more advanced state of _Sensory Depravation_. And then there's _Power_."

Oujou groaned. "You know that I'm going to ask this, so why are you even bothering not to elaborate: what is _Power_?"

Jason grinned for a moment. "_Power_ is the advanced form of _Energy Transfer_. The name actually doesn't fit it, but…. Anyway, _Power_ gives the user the ability to control _any_ form of energy, including alices. They can't control the alice user, but they can control the alice itself." Oujou opened her mouth, but Jason cut her off. "I know, you want to know about it being an advanced form. That means that a person with the alice _Energy Transfer_ actually has the alice change into _Power_. There's a process for that to happen, for any alice to turn into a more advanced form. It's really rare, by the way.

"Anyway, there is a catalyst, and then a relatively rapid power growth, and then another catalyst, sometimes the same as the first, and then the alice becomes its more advanced form."

Oujou's eyes widened, and she swore under her breath. "Have you seen my past?" she demanded, and Jason shook his head. "Okay. Then, I need to try something. I think that that catalyst may have…happened to me."

"Wha—no."

"Yes."

"No, you're not doing that."

"Yes, I am."

Satsuto began to stand up, asking, "What the hell are you talking about?"

Jason didn't even look over at him. "Sit down, Headmaster-san." Satsuto's legs gave way, and he sat back down. "Now shut up. This isn't your conversation." Satsuto's mouth snapped shut.

Oujou stared at him for a moment—she had never seen anybody use their power so casually. It was almost frightening.

"I'm not going to let you kill yourself," Jason told Oujou, and Satsuto let out a squeak.

Oujou shook her head. "You won't stop me."

"Yes, I will."

"No, you won't. You're curious. And anyway, if I'm out of the way, you won't have as much to worry about. I'm your enemy, remember."

Jason took a deep breath. "We need to talk about that, but not now. I can't let you do this. I can just knock you out. Without me…helping you, you'd be practically unconscious anyway."

"_Energy Transfer_ can temporarily bring things back to life." Jason froze, his eyes huge, and then he closed them slowly.

"Of course," he muttered to himself. "That makes sense. If you can shove enough energy in…but you'd have to take other energy…unless you use your own…." He trailed off, still mouthing words, no sound coming out of his mouth.

Oujou smiled sardonically, then began pulling her control devices off, one by one. After the second came off, her heart rate increased. With Satsuto staring at her, his eyes wide and horrified, Oujou pulled the last device off of her ear.

Jason's eyes shot open, a quiet trail of obscenities streaming from his mouth as he watched Oujou. Her face was completely drained of blood, and her eyes were blue, the exact same shade as Jason's.

"Holy…" Jason breathed, and his voice was mirrored by Oujou's.

Oujou smiled and murmured, "Do you see what I see?" And then her blue eyes faded back to black and she slumped forward in her chair. Jason blanched, sucking in a deep breath of air.

"I could feel her," he muttered. "Dammit, that's not natural." Leaning forward, he touched Oujou's shoulder. She didn't react, and he sighed, crouching down and fastening her control devices back on her. "That was bizarre. Incredibly dangerous, but bizarre."

Satsuto stared at him. "What the hell are you talking about? What did she do?"

Jason's eyes flew over to meet Satsuto's. "She used _Power_. She took control of…my alice, I believe. But a God alice is only supposed to have at most one person at a time with that alice, so it had interesting results."

"What do you mean '_interesting_'?"

Jason smiled a little. "I just said, I could feel her. I could feel her actually using the power, and from her statement, I assume that she could feel me using my power." Groaning, he shoved his hair out of his eyes. "You can move, headmaster-san. Just don't try to interfere again."

Satsuto's eyes narrowed. "What the hell are you talking about, 'interfere'? I was asking a question." He frowned and stood up, his eyes narrowing even more. "Why are you participating with us? As she pointed out, you're our enemy."

Jason stood up and straightened out. "I'm not your enemy. I'm on the side of the children. In a way, so is Safehouse, but you are, in some ways, Safehouse's enemy. They trust me, though, so they won't bother you." He paused, a lock of hair falling back in his eyes. "You're going to have to leave, though. They'll get suspicious. Especially because they want to talk to you."

"How do you know we won't tell?" Satsuto challenged.

A small smirk touched Jason's lips. "You won't."

--

_**I have to say again, I'm really sorry that that was so short. I hope that that helped those who were confused again. Like always, I don't know when I'll post again next. If you have any questions, ask, and I'll try to answer them. And please try to review.**_


	32. Goodbye

_**Oh, God, I'm sorry. I really didn't want to take this long, but I didn't have any ideas. I do now, clearly, and that was the only way I managed to crank this chapter out. Sorry again for the long delay.**_

_--_

_Let us go to war. The world has become stale and insipid, the ships ought to be all captured, and the cities battered down, and the world burned up, so that we can start again. There would be fun in that. Some interest, — something to talk about._

_-Editorial in the _New York Journal of Commerce_ (August 1845)_

Jason looked at the two other teens sitting near him. "You two are going to need to check in—you've been too long without contacting them. And that means we need to get you two out of here."

Satsuto walked past Jason, keeping on eye on the blond teen, then leaned down and touched Oujou on the shoulder. She didn't react.

"Dammit," he muttered. "This is bad." His eyes flashing, Satsuto spun to look at Jason. "What's wrong with her?"

Sighing, Jason closed his eyes for a moment. When he reopened them, they were blank for a second; then, suddenly, they returned to their normal blue. "For one thing, even taking off the control devices took a lot out of her. She's completely exhausted. She's seriously sleep deprived. She also hasn't eaten in a while."

"How the hell do you know she hasn't eaten?" Satsuto demanded, wide-eyed. Jason smiled slightly and absently tapped his temple, his eyes never leaving Oujou.

"I would say we shouldn't wake her up, but truthfully, the two of you need to check in as soon as possible, and it may be rather suspicious if she's unconscious." He touched Oujou on the forehead, his other hand pushing Satsuto's hand off of Oujou's shoulder. "Come on, Oujou," he whispered. "Wake up."

Oujou's eyes fluttered opened, and then she swore and snapped them closed again. "It didn't work."

Satsuto's tried to grab her shoulder, but Jason pushed him away, locking eyes with Oujou. "What didn't work?" he demanded, his voice harsher than it had been before.

"I'm not dead, for one thing," she told him, reopening her eyes; she squinted against the dim incandescent light of the room.

A muscle in Jason's through jumped. "Were you _trying_ to die?"

Oujou shook her head, moving away from Jason's hand. "No, but you have to admit that it's an interesting idea." Satsuto opened his mouth to say something, but he turned away instead, obviously trying to control his temper. "Get off me. Actually, I meant that I can't use _Power_ now. It's gone again."

Jason gave a visible sigh of relief, but Satsuto didn't turn back around. He was breathing heavily, more heavily than before, and his face was sheet-white. Jason sighed again. "Look, as I was telling headmaster-san, you two need to check in."

He helped Oujou up, then led the two of them out of the room and down a few hallways until they reached the entranceway. "Before you go, I need to put a little…safeguard in effect so you can't tell where we are even if you want to." Not giving either of them time to respond, he laid two fingers of each other their foreheads and closed his eyes. Each of his hands glowed for a second, then dimmed and went back to normal.

Oujou blinked a few times, rubbing her forehead when Jason removed his hand. Satsuto just frowned, looking up at the ceiling thoughtfully. "We're going to need your help," Oujou told Jason, who nodded.

"I know," he responded. "It's just—we can't help you just yet. There are a few things that must be done on both ends first."

Both Oujou and Satsuto nodded, and then grabbed their backpacks—both of which were sitting in the entrance room—and opened the metal panel. Oujou climbed out first, Satsuto climbing out behind her. When they were both outside, the panel slid shut again.

"That was surreal," Satsuto muttered, rubbing his hand against his forehead where Jason had touched him. Oujou nodded, walking with him until they reached a safe distance away from the Safehouse headquarters. Then, he dialed the phone number of the Headquarters of Alice Academy, which was in Germany.

A person picked up immediately, and after a dialogue of German, Satsuto was directed to one of the second-in-commands, a man named Felix Schulz.

"This is Headmaster Satsuto of the Japanese branch Gakuen Alice, code Ur Hagalaz with D-class student Oujou Kanjouinyuu, code Yr Wyrd. I am checking in."

There was a pause, and then Felix Shulz responded, his voice soft and washed-out, as though coming from a great distance. "Your check-in has been received, Satsuto. Is there any trouble?"

Sensing Oujou's eyes on him, Satsuto swallowed, then answered, "No, there is no trouble. The signal for my phone went down for a while."

"I see," came the quiet reply. "I have a message from Mr. Geier, code Feoh Thorn. You and Oujou Kanjouinyuu are to report to Headquarters immediately. That is all."

Satsuto swore under his breath, turning to glance at Oujou. She was staring back at him, so he turned around again. "Message received. Satsuto out." He snapped the phone shut, knowing that Shulz wouldn't say goodbye—it wasn't protocol. Then, he spun on his heels so he could talk to Oujou.

"They want us in Germany immediately."

Oujou didn't respond for a moment. Then, "What? What the hell are you talking about?"

Sighing, Satsuto shifted his leg from one leg to the other, then back. "The head of the Alice Academy Headquarters in Germany is requesting that both of us report in immediately." Oujou raised an eyebrow, and Satsuto sighed again. "Yes, you do have to go. He's your superior, and even more so because you are in the Dangerous Abilities Class."

"I assume we're going to go, then." Oujou's voice was dry, and Satsuto only nodded. "And how exactly are we getting there?"

Instead of responding verbally, Satsuto looked up; the sound of a helicopter filled the air, and Oujou looked up as well. A moment later, the helicopter landed on the ground thirty feet from them, and four men in dark suits exited.

Satsuto walked up to meet them, and Oujou trailed after, a limp becoming slightly noticeable in her step.

When the two groups met, the first person to speak was a tall, steely-eyed man in a suit. "Code?" he demanded, his hand on a lump in his jacket pocket. A gun.

Satsuto didn't bat an eye. "Ur Hagalaz and Yr Wyrd. Headmaster and D-class." The man's hand remained were it was for a second, and then he let it drop.

"Come here," he told the two of them, then turned and began walking back towards the helicopter. Another man walked behind him, and two men followed behind Oujou and Satsuto. They looked like bodyguards, and Oujou had a feeling that she and Satsuto were in more danger than anybody was willing to let on.

When they entered the helicopter, the door was shut immediately behind them, and both teens were told to take a seat and put on their seatbelts. They did, and the helicopter took off. One of the men in suits—not the one that was piloting—began talking to someone on his headset.

Ten minutes later, they landed about fifty feet from an airport, and the four men rushed Oujou and Satsuto out and to a private plane. Soon after the two teens were strapped in, the plane sped down the tarmac, and they took off.

They were going to Germany.

**--**

**_Okay, I have no idea if I'll be able to post next month at all. I'm going to participate in Script Frenzy, something I've never done before, and writing a 100 page screenplay in a month is going to be really hard for me. If I can, I'll write, but if I can't, I'm really sorry._**


	33. Germany

**_Sorry sorry sorry sorry sorry. I can't believe I took so long. Well, actually, I can, but I'm sorry anyway. So, I really hope you enjoy, and again, I'm sorry._**

--

_All colors and blends of Americans have somewhat the same tendencies. It's a breed — selected out by accident. And so we're overbrave and overfearful — we're kind and cruel as children. We're overfriendly and at the same time frightened of strangers._

_-John Steinbeck, East of Eden, 1952_

They had bodyguards.

That was one of the first thoughts Oujou had as she and Satsuto walked off of the plane and into the all-white terminal of the gigantic building they were entering. It seemed superfluous now, inside these solid-looking walls with the only exits leading into the plane or manned by guards carrying automatic rifles.

"What happened to your crutches?" Oujou looked up at the sound of Satsuto's voice in her ear; he was walking near-silently beside her, one hand rubbing the spot on his forehead where Jason had touched him.

Oujou shrugged, trying harder to hide her limp. "They vanished somewhere in the Safehouse. I'm fine." But even as she spoke, her leg gave a sharp jolt of pain. She could tell that baring her weight on it was _not_ a good idea.

An arm wound around her, under her arm, and Satsuto propped her up against him, carrying some of her weight for her. "I'd say we should stop and get you some crutches, but Mr. Geier will want to talk to us as soon as possible. He doesn't like to be left waiting."

Oujou nodded, trying to find a comfortable way to walk without putting too much strain on her leg or any other of her wounds. They were all starting to ache, and as much as she didn't want to and wouldn't admit it, she wanted a pain reliever. Sort of.

"Who's Mr. Geier, anyway?"

Satsuto tightened his grip on her for a second, his fingers digging into her side until she gasped; he immediately loosened his grip, an apologetic expression crossing his face. "Sorry. Um, Mr. Geier—"

"Spreading rumors about me, Satsuto?" At the sound of that voice, Satsuto doubled over into a bow, dragging Oujou down along with him; she trembled from the pain, but he didn't seem to notice. "I thought I asked you to stop doing that. You're not in Japan."

In a sudden, almost jolty movement, Satsuto straightened, once again dragging Oujou with him. She cringed at the sudden movement, her free hand flying to her stomach.

"Sorry, Geier-dono," Satsuto murmured, his eyes on the ground before him. Oujou watched Geier's reaction as he frowned a little, then smiled gently, taking a few steps towards the two teenagers. He was about twenty to twenty-five, with military-style brown hair, tan skin, and no accent to speak of in his flawless Japanese. He was dressed in a dark, severe suit with a crisp white shirt and a blood-red tie.

Geier took a few more steps towards them, until he was only a few feet in front of them; he met Oujou's gaze with a twinkle in his eye, then reached over and touched Satsuto's shoulder. Satsuto jumped, his eyes flying up to Geier's face.

"Hello, Satsuto," Geier's tone was warm, almost fatherly, and Satsuto allowed himself a small smile. "How are you going?"

Satsuto stared at him, looking as though he was astounded Geier had ever asked that. "I'm fine, sire. How are you?"

Geier's smile grew. "I'm doing well. And I'm guessing this sullen young woman is Oujou Kanjouinyuu." He gestured to Oujou, who raised an eyebrow but otherwise didn't react.

"Uh, yes, sir. She's the, uh, highest scoring student on the final exam, so she, uh, got to leave the school for a week."

Geier stared speculatively at Satsuto, both eyebrows rising almost suggestively. "So you decided to…accompany her?" It wasn't really a question, but Satsuto nodded anyway. "I see."

"What's your power?" Oujou put in in the lull of conversation; Geier turned his attention to back to her, though she guessed he had been watching her the entire time.

Geier didn't answer verbally, but instead stared Oujou in the eyes, his brown eyes flashing yellow for a moment. Oujou felt her eyes growing heavy, but she couldn't close them; she couldn't move at all. At least, not consciously. But still, her body snapped to attention, the cage her mind was locked in not even allowing her a hiss of pain as the movement jarred her wounds. Frantic, she fought the bonds on her mind, the cage that Geier seemed to have trapped her in. She hated that she wasn't in control, that once again she was losing control of her body. What if her alice came out?

What if she hurt someone again?"

"Geier-dono," Satsuto cried, touching Oujou's shoulder. "Please, stop. She's injured." Immediately, the tension on her mind vanished, and she could move of her own free will again; she doubled over as best as she could, holding her stomach were the wounds hurt the most. "Hey, are you okay?" Satsuto laid a hand on her shoulder, and without thinking she threw it off, just hating the feeling of flesh against her, the feeling of all of his emotions running though her and freeing all of her own that she was trying to keep muted, to keep in control.

Geier nodded, but didn't touch Oujou, or look into her eyes again; instead, he focused is gaze somewhere on her face—lower than her eyes, but not too low.

Oujou took a few deep breaths, calming herself back down. Satsuto took that opportunity to speak, drawing the attention away from Oujou and onto himself. "Geier-dono, what did you call us here for?"

"I have a few things to discuss with you and Kanjou—"

"Oujou," she corrected, her eyes flashing in the light."

Geier smiled. "I have to discuss a few things with you and _Oujou_ regarding the AAO." He gestured down the hall with his hand, but kept his eyes on the two teens. "Why don't you follow me to my office?"

He began walking down the hall; it was clear that he expected them to follow him, that his orders were always followed as soon as he gave them, no questions asked. Satsuto immediately began walking behind him, and Oujou followed after him, fighting to keep her breathing steady.

When they reached the office, Oujou took the chair was offered, placing one hand over the bullet wound on her stomach. Satsuto sat beside her, and Geier sat in the chair across the desk, staring at them through shrewd eyes.

"I understand that you are—or were—in contact with people from the AAO."

Satsuto opened his mouth to answer Geier, but Geier shut him up with a shake of his head and a nod towards Oujou. Oujou raised an eyebrow coolly, making sure she kept her voice from trembling when she spoke. "And if I was?"

"That was not an accusation. I was merely stating a fact. Is there any way for you to contact a person that you know in the AAO and find out what is being planned?"

"No."

Geier looked resigned, but not surprised at the answer; clearly, he had known that she wouldn't agree. "Whom have you been in contact with in the AAO?"

"One's dead, and the other…well, does the name Azumi Yuka sound familiar to you?"

If Geier was surprised, he hid it well. She could feel that he was happy about something—that, perhaps—and that he was worried—about that again, perhaps—but he showed very little surprise.

Geier nodded. "Of course it does, and you know that I know it." He smiled again, his expression lighting up like it would on a small child. "Are you in contact with anybody else? The head of the AAO, possibly, or another high standing member?"

Oujou rolled her eyes, but instead her heart froze; was she, and she just didn't know about it? Of course, how many people outside of Gakuen Alice was she in contact with anyway? One? Two?

"Not that I know of."

"That's alright." As if it for some reason wouldn't be. "So, have you talked to Yuka since the invasion? Do you have any ideas of what they're planning?"

"No and no." Why the hell would he expect _her_ of all people to know? She was just one of many in one of a few schools.

Of course, she was…special.

Geier raised an eyebrow, then let it fall; even though he wasn't even looking at Satsuto, she could tell he was following every move the teenager made. "Who was the person that you know that died?"

Oujou's jaw tightened. "None of your business."

"Where did you know them from?"

"None of your business."

"What was your relationship with this person?"

"_None of your business._"

"Well, it's going to be my business eventually. I want you and Satsuto to lead the Japanese Gakuen Alice in the war against the AAO."

--

**_I have no idea when I'll post next, because I'm seriously making this up as I go along. I had no idea what was going to happen until about two seconds before I wrote it. Anyway, please review. Thanks._**


	34. Walk Away

_**Sorry. Really, I am. Anyway, here's the next chapter. I hope you like it. Please read it. Thanks.**_

_--_

_When you live, your life will end sooner or later... The body will return to the earth. Grass and flowers will grow on top of it. The soul will nourish the hearts... and it will live on in the hearts of other people. Everything in this world flows around and circulates. That goes for human lives too._

_-Izumi, from Fullmetal Alchemist_

"_I want you and Satsuto to lead the Japanese Gakuen Alice in the war against the AAO."_

Oujou stared at the man in front of her, her face a model of both astonishment and disgust before she marshaled in her emotions and ironed out her expression until it was blank.

"No."

Geier raised one eyebrow, but he wasn't surprised. "What do you want?" His voice was calm, and they matched his emotions, which were as carefully reigned in as hers.

"What do I want?" Oujou's stared him in the face, her eyes cold and hard, devoid of any identifiable emotion. "I want a good night's sleep, one not plagues by nightmares. I want to waste away into dust, just so I won't have to feel anymore. I want to shoot myself in the head, I want to throw myself off a bridge, I want to drown myself, I want to stab myself in the chest. None of that is going to happen. So does it matter what I want?"

Satsuto's face turned sheet white, then pale green, and he turned away, a hand covering his mouth as he struggled to keep his emotions from erupting. Geier continued to stare at Oujou.

"We can get you a good night's sleep."

An emotion flashed across Oujou's eyes, too fast to identify. "I don't want drugs."

"We can get you help with your nightmares, then."

"I don't want therapy."

Geier sighed, and exasperation shot through him, only serving to heighten Oujou's own exasperation. "We need you to lead this. You have the most experience with the AAO of anyone in the school—and you have remained relatively detached, it seems."

"_I won't lead them._ How hard is that to understand? Ask Hyuuga-san." She couldn't lead them. She couldn't do that.

"That was considered. But Natsume has too many distractions. You are nearly completely detached from your classmates, and you have shown the ability to not only fight well but also plan and use your alices to their highest potential."

Jesus. Did they not understand that she was dying? "I won't do this. Nobody will listen to me. I'm just another student. I'm just one of many, and they won't listen to me."

Geier smiled; Satsuto's color was beginning to return, and he turned back to face the two people. "Of course they will listen to you. You are a leader even without trying, and they will be able to see your strength. Now what do you want? What will be enough of an incentive for you that you will agree to lead them."

"Nothing." There was nothing she could receive that would drive her to do this. She was dying. She wasn't going to live through this war. And she couldn't throw away the lives of _anyone_ at that school if she wasn't going to be able to live to face the consequences.

Oujou stood and began limping out of the office. She wasn't going to do it, so there was no reason for her to stay any longer.

She heard Satsuto jump to his feet, but Geier stayed in his chair. He didn't move. Satsuto followed her, but she sped up, ignoring the pain lancing through her entire body.

Geier's voice stopped her, though only temporarily. "You cannot run away from this. We own you."

Oujou closed her eyes for a second, then kept on walking.

--

Oujou wasn't sure how she got out of the building, but she found herself standing outside of the building on the main street of what looked like the heart of a German city. She didn't care where she went, as long as it wasn't there.

A man walked up to her, his large, square-shaped face covered by sunglasses. "High-master Geier requested that I escort you to the Academy of Alice." His Japanese had a thick German accent, one that nearly blurred out all of his words until they were barely understandable.

Without thinking, Oujou lashed out, managing to strike him across the face before he grabbed both her wrists, immobilizing her. She kicked out with her uninjured leg, which he trapped between his knees, leaving her off-balance on her injured leg. Pain shot through her body, and she began to fall, only to be caught from behind by someone.

The square-faced man released her, and she fell completely back into the person holding her up, though she struggled to her feet and spun around to face them as soon as she was able to right herself.

It was a boy, fourteen or fifteen, wearing a crisp white button-down shirt with the Alice Academy symbol embroidered onto it and a pair of pressed black pants. A girl stood two steps behind and three steps to the left of him. She was about sixteen, dressed in the exact same clothing as the boy, with a streak of bright sea green through her long black hair.

The boy spoke in flawless Japanese. "As you have been told, we are to escort you to our Alice Academy."

Oujou frowned in spite of herself, remembering what she had been told before. "The Alice Academy in Germany is not supposed to be completed for years."

The girl stepped forward. "We will explain on the way. Come. Follow us." She pivoted on one heel and began walking away; the boy followed her, Oujou behind him, and the square-faced man behind her.

"What's going on?" Oujou asked as they wove through traffic; her hand rested on the gun in her pocket just in case.

It was the girl the answered, her voice just loud enough to be heard over the noise of the crowd. "Part of the Academy is finished. Not all of it. Only the part to hold the so-called 'dangerous' students, like us."

Oujou stopped moving, to see if they would continue, but simultaneously, all three of her escorts stopped and turned to face her. "What?" the boy snapped, his dark eyes narrowing at her as the girl and the man glanced around the crowd as though looking for some hidden assailant.

"Nothing," Oujou told him, and they began walking again. She couldn't tell where they were going, but that didn't matter that much—all that mattered was that it took as much time as possible for them to get there.

About five minutes later—at which time Oujou was limping heavily, her leg throbbing in pain—they reached a small side street, which they slipped into. Thirty feet in front of them was a large gray-black gate, which only partially hid from view a massive concrete building.

The girl typed a code into a keypad by the gate, and the gate swung open a moment later, staying open only long enough to allow the four people to enter before swinging shut again.

Oujou was lead into the building—which required another keypad-entry—and was shown to what appeared to be a lobby. It looked more like a prison than a school, with its sterile gray walls and lack of windows, which didn't surprise Oujou in the least.

"This is the Dangerous-Ability Alice Center of the German Alice Academy," the girl began, shoving a lock of hair out of her face. "It is hoped that, when the war is over, all Dangerous-Ability students will be situated here. Many of them have very few ties to their home school, due to the nature of their—our—Alice type, so it shouldn't be too difficult to transfer."

It sounded completely scripted.

"You will be staying here until High-Master Geier decides to send you back to the Japanese Gakuen Alice. If there is something you require, please inform us, and we will see if we can accommodate it."

Oujou nodded, thinking. Was there anything?

"Actually, do you have any Unlimited-Alice Type pills?" Her vision was going out again, a side effect of overuse. Or, in her case, of living.

The girl nodded, and after instructing Oujou to follow her, began walking down one of the hallways. When they stopped, they were in front of a room labeled "Medicine Lab". The girl led Oujou in, then back out, closing the door behind her. The blue-haired boy in the room turned around when the door closed.

"What do you need?" he asked, turning back around and keeping his hands busy with some a test-tube full of some clear liquid that probably wasn't water. "Alice-limiter pills? Anti-pheromone pills? If you want Alice-strengthening pills, you can't have any if you don't have a mission paper."

Oujou sighed. "I need Unlimited-Alice Type pills. Do you have any of those?"

The boy turned around again, setting the test-tube down in a rack before letting go and wiping his hands against the white lab coat he was wearing. "What Alices do you have?"

"What if I don't want to tell?"

"Why wouldn't you?"

Good point. "I have _Energy Transfer_."

The boy muttered something in German, but didn't interrupt any other way. Oujou sighed. The next one would probably get more of a reaction, if he knew anything about Unlimited Alice Type.

"And _Empathy_."

The boy's eyes widened. "Holy _shit_, you have Unlimited Type _Empathy_ and you're still alive. Okay, um, sit down." He gestured to a stool near where she was standing. "And, um, are both of your Alices Unlimited Type?"

"Yes."

"Okay." He began rummaging through a drawer, until he pulled out a syringe, a clear vial, and some pills. "An injection would give you faster results, but, um, do you mind needles? Because if you don't and you lose control 'cause your weakness is messing with your control, we're all going to be in trouble, because I can tell how strong you are."

Oh, jeez. "Look, just inject the stuff in me. I won't lose control." That was one thing she could make sure of.

The boy did something, then wiped down her upper arm with an alcohol swab and pressed the needle into her skin. She felt a sharp prick, and then her vision cleared completely and a lot of the Alice-related pain went away.

The rest of the pain, remained, though.

"Did that help?" the boy asked, placing a band-aid on her arm at the injection sight. When Oujou nodded, he continued on, asking, "Do you need anything else? You know, a pain killer or something?"

"Do you have any Control Devices?" Since hers didn't seem to be helping as much anymore.

The boy nodded. "Sure. How many do you need?" He paused. "Wait, how many do you have?"

"Four."

The boy sat down on a stool in front of her. "Why do you need more then. Oh, and have you heard of _Power_? I mean your Alice's—"

"Advanced stage, yeah. I've heard of it. I need more because my Alice is in the permanent stage of becoming more powerful, without leveling out. I can feel the emotion of everyone within nearly a four-hundred feet radius." And that alone sucked, even without the health problems that went along with it. "My head hurts from it."

It took a lot to admit that.

Damn, she had problems.

The boy jumped to his feet and went rifling through another one of his drawers. "I would ask how strong you wanted them, but I can _feel_ the strength of your Alice, so it's kind of pointless. By the way, that's one of my Alices. I can sense the strength of other people's Alices. Sort of. Yours are past the point where I can sense a difference."

He pulled out a few thin necklaces with black stones hanging from them, and what looked like a regular square piece of paper. He handed the necklaces to her, waiting for her to clasp them around her neck before handing her the paper and a needle.

"Draw a few drops of blood and put them on this paper. The color it changes with determine your—whoa, I said a few drops, not a pint." Oujou had cut her hand open, and blood gushed open onto the paper and onto the floor, where it spread, staining the grout between the tiles a brownish-red.

Oujou sighed and handed the blood-soaked paper back to the boy, who handled it as though it was a cancer-causing chemical. He peered at it as the blood soaked completely into it and it turned a dark gray, almost black.

"Damn," he muttered, reverting back to German for a moment as he examined the piece of paper.

Oujou grimaced. "What is it?"

"Okay, I need to explain something to you. Well, do you know what God Alices are?" When Oujou nodded, he continued. "Good, that makes this explanation much easier. Um, well, God Alices are generally the strongest Alices, with only a few exceptions, such as Natsume Hyuuga's Fire Alice, and they are usually between 70 and 85 percent…darkness, I guess you'd call it. I can pretty much stop sensing the difference around 80%. You're…well, you have to be at least 93 or 94 percent, maybe even more. Nobody's 100. Nobody ever has been.

"What are you?"

--

_**Okay, I have no idea when I'm posting next. Please review. Please. I need to know what to fix. It would help a lot. Thanks.**_


	35. Christof Wolf

**_Hi again. Sorry for taking so long. I hope you enjoyed the last chapter. I hope people still read this. Whatever. Anyway, there will be about ten to fifteen chapters after this, then an epilogue, and then it will be over._**

**_Well, please enjoy._**

_--_

_In cases of doubtful morality, it is usual to say, Is there any harm in doing this? This question may sometimes be best answered by asking ourselves another: Is there any harm in letting it alone?_

_-Charles Caleb Colton_

"_What are you?"_

Oujou smiled. "What am I? That's a funny question. I'm…well, if you get to know who I am, I should get to know who you are, shouldn't I?"

The boy nodded, smiling sheepishly. "My name is Christof Wolf. Chris. My powers, 'cause I guess you want to know them, are _Healing, Medicine, _and_ Feeling_. The only one that's not really self-explanatory is _Feeling_, which allows the user to sense the ability levels of other Alice users. So, who're you?"

Oujou sighed. "Who am I. I am…I am Oujou Kanjouinyuu, daughter of Oujou Hiruka and Oujou Kisuke."

A phone rang, and immediately both Oujou and Christof pulled their cell phones out of their pockets, looking at the screens simultaneously; Oujou rolled her eyes and flipped her phone open, pressing it to her ear while Christof pocketed his.

"What do you want?" she snapped into the phone, her tone going abruptly from being casual to being pissed off.

"_Where are you?_" Satsuto shot back, his tone just as pissed.

Jesus. Was he stupid? "Ask your precious 'High-master'."

There was a paused, and then the sound of some muffled German in the background. Then Satsuto came back on. "We need to return back home tomorrow. You will stay with the German Alice Academy until then. I will see you tomorrow."

"Bye." Oujou hung up without waiting for him to say goodbye, then turned to face Christof. "I'm stuck here until tomorrow."

Christof smiled. "That's good to hear. Why are you so angry at your headmaster?"

Oujou sighed, debating how much to tell him. "I am supposed to help him lead a war that I won't live through. I can't do that."

Christof raised an eyebrow, as though seriously considering her statement. "You don't want to, or is it some sort of moral problem you have with it?"

"Moral. I should get going now."

She climbed to her feet, pressing her eyelids together until the multi-colored spots stopped swimming across her vision and she composed herself. "I'll walk you back out. This place is a goddamn maze."

"Fine."

She opened her eyes, and she and Christof walked out of the room and down the hall. Before they reached the main lobby, though, he handed her a small, clear container filled with about a hundred little white pills.

"This is enough Anti-Unlimited Alice Type drugs to last you for 25 days. Take two at a time, twice a day. There are a hundred in here. If you take more than three at a time, or more than five in a day, you will overdose. A word of advice: if you're going to take three, take it in the morning. It's much more useful." He gestured towards the lobby. "Here we are. I'll see you later."

Oujou nodded and walked into the lobby, where the girl and the boy were waiting, each perched in what looked like incredibly uncomfortable chairs. They both stood in unison when Oujou walked in.

"We shall take you to your room," the girl announced, and Oujou nodded, following the girl down a different hallway to a small, square, sterile room with no windows. It held only a cot, a desk, a chair, and a lamp.

As soon as the door was closed, Oujou lay down on the bed and closed her eyes so she could think.

--

Natsume stood beside Hotaru and Mikan as the three of them watched a computer screen. Lines of text ran across it as Hotaru scrolled down. Pages and pages, lines and lines.

"What is this?" Natsume demanded, peering at the screen, where text continued to appear.

Hotaru stared at it and sighed. "It's a hack. They've tried to get in seven times since the raid—four of which have been since Oujou left. They're goddamn brilliant—I can't trace them. It's bouncing all over the world."

"What are they trying to do? Get information?"

Hotaru scrolled to a particular place, then sat down in the chair in front of the computer, looking older than her fourteen years. "Get information. Overload our systems. Take control of our systems. Get into classified student files, like yours, or Oujou's."

Natsume leaned back against the wall, and Mikan latched onto his hand, smiling at him. He ignored her, closing his eyes and shoving a lock of hair out of his face.

"Something's going to happen. Soon. That's why they took all those students."

He could hear Hotaru's smile in her voice. "Very clever, Hyuua-san. But before we can do anything, we need to wait for the return of Oujou and the headmaster. They will know what's going on."

"How do you know that?"

Natsume opened his eyes just in time to see a smirk flash across Hotaru's face. "Because the tracking device on Oujou isn't transmitting anymore. They've been somewhere that hides itself well, and so they've been talking to people who don't want to be found. People who know what's going on."

--

Oujou lay on her bed, staring up at the plain white ceiling above her. She wasn't sure what was going to happen. She couldn't lead Gakuen Alice—_she couldn't_—but she didn't have much of a choice.

It just wasn't right to do that, if she wasn't going to have to face the consequences. It was like getting a free pass, and she couldn't do that. She couldn't send innocent people, people with no real say in the matter, and no bearing in the situation, to death, and not have to face any consequences.

She wouldn't even have to face the guilt.

The idea sickened her.

Her phone rang again and, swearing, she pulled it out of her pocket and, flipping it open, shoved it up to her ear.

Before she could get a word in, Satsuto's voice came through the speaker. "Oujou?"

"_What_?" She was in no mood to be polite. Truthfully, at this point, she couldn't care less.

Satsuto sighed. "Oujou, please listen to me. You have to lead this with me. You have to."

"No I don't." A pang of hunger shot through her, and she tried the last time she had eaten. Days? She didn't know how long it had been since she had left Gakuen Alice. "What could possibly motivate me to do that?"

"Think about this." Jesus Christ. He was actually going to try to convince her. "If you don't help lead this, it is likely that more people will die."

Damn. "But then it wouldn't be on my head, would it?"

"It wouldn't be on your head that you could have saved countless lives, and you didn't."

"Potentially not saving hypothetical lives is better than sending innocent people to die." But he did have a point. Not that she would let him know that.

Satsuto paused, then sighed again. "How? How is that any better?"

"Because if it's hypothetical, it might not happen. I know that, if I lead this, I will have to send people out to die. And I can't face that with no consequences. It isn't right."

His voice was getting harder now, but he didn't sound angry. She wasn't sure how he sounded, and it annoyed her. "And it is right to force someone else to do that."

Abruptly, she lost her temper. "Why can't you do it by yourself?" she shrieked at him, and then her voice grew quieter, though the anger didn't leave it. "I know you are comfortable with sending people off to die. Why can't you just do it?"

Satsuto's voice was quiet, and tired, ashamed. "I know what I've done, and I regret it. But I have no choice. I have no say in the matter, Oujou. And do you think I will be able to face myself, to look in the mirror and bear to look at what I see, if I do this?"

Her temper flared up again. "So it's alright to force this on somebody else, then?"

"No—that wasn't what I meant." His voice was pleading now, and she felt the nearly undeniable urge to throw the phone across the room, but she contained herself just in time.

"Then what the hell did you mean?"

"Look, I just—I can't do this by myself."

"Find someone else."

"Oujou." He was begging now, and it disgusted her. It disgusted the hell out of her.

"_Find someone else_."

"I can't."

"I don't care. I won't do it."

She was about to hang up, and he could sense it, so he blurted out, "Do you want to be responsible for the death of any more people?"

Oujou froze, her pulse thundering through her veins, thumping in her ears. "What?"

"Do you want to be responsible for the death of any more people? You can save lives by doing this. You have an obligation."

"I have no obligation. I won't be saving AAO lives."

"They're cruel. They don't—"

"What," Oujou cut in, "they don't deserve to live? Who are you to decide who deserves to live."

Satsuto sighed. "Just listen to me. If you do this, I will try to convince Highmaster Geier not to place Sakura Mikan-san in a high security facility. I will try to convince him that she will be safe with Hyuuga Natsume-san. Do we have a deal?"

"We have a deal. But if you break this, so help me God."

"I won't break this. I am a man of my word. That's pretty much all I have left."

"Goodbye, Headmaster Satsuto. See you tomorrow."

"Goodbye."

--

_**Well, I have about half of the next one written already, so it shouldn't take this long to post again. Sorry about that. Please review. Thanks.**_


	36. Preparation

**Hi. Here's the next chapter. Sorry it took so long. I have a ton of homework to do. I have 11 chapters of French to learn this summer, and I just finished chapter 6. Ack.**

**Anyway, hope you enjoy.**

--

_War never ends, it only pales, reddens, blackens, and lightens again._

_-Steven Rawn_

By the time everything had gotten settled, and all of the students were in place in the auditorium, Oujou and Satsuto were standing on the stage, ignoring the whispers and murmurs coming from the crowd.

Oujou rubbed the side of her abdomen, where sharp pains still shot through every once in a while, despite Subaru's healing.

Satsuto had written a speech while they were on the flight back from Germany, but Oujou, ignoring his request to do the same, had pretended to rest until the hum of the plain had lulled her into an uneasy, nightmare-plagued sleep.

Satsuto stepped in front of the microphone, tapping it to check that it was on. "My name is Imota Satsuto, headmaster of the Japanese Gakuen Alice. As you all know, recently there was an invasion of the school by the AAO, and multiple students were taken. This was all a prelude to what we believe will be a much greater fight. As of now, until further notice, classes will be running at a half-schedule. The rest of the time will be used to train and prepare for the upcoming fight.

"The section leaders will be Narumi-san, Hyuuga-san, Jinno-san, Noda-san, and Yamada-san. Every person over the age of eleven will be expected to fight. Any person under that age is permitted to request fight, but there is no guarantee that that request will be granted. Oujou Kanjouinyuu and I will be leading this operation. All section leaders are to meet with us now; everyone else is to return to their rooms until meal time."

Everyone flooded out of the room except for the section leaders, who walked up to the stage. Satsuto addressed all of them when they congregated around him. "Follow me to my office."

He and Oujou headed towards his office, and the four section leaders followed without a word. When they reached the office, Satsuto sat down at his desk, leaving Oujou standing beside him and the section leaders in front of him.

"Before I tell you anything, you have to understand something: arguing will do you no good. Don't try."

Natsume spoke up, drawing the eyes of the others. "What the hell is going on?"

"There's going to be a war, Hyuuga," Oujou shot at him. "Just listen."

Satsuto sighed, then continued on as though he had never been interrupted. "The five of you will lead different sections of this operation. Hyuuga-san will be in charge of the offense. Jinno-san will be in charge of the defense. Noda-san will be in charge of the special alice type group. Narumi-san will be in charge of the dangerous ability class. Yamada-san will lead the rest. First, Hyuuga-san will choose the students he needs for the offense. Then, Jinno-san will choose all those he needs for the defense. The dangerous ability students will go to Narumi-san, the special ability students will go to Noda-san, and the rest available to fight will go to Yamada-san.

"Oujou-san and Hyuuga-san will be in charge of the basic training. Oujou-san and I will jointly be in charge of the operation. Follow any orders from either of us. If any of you leave your post for any reason without permission, I will personally kick your ass when this is done."

They all nodded, stoic, and then Oujou spoke. "If Satsuto-san is finished, I need to speak to Hyuuga-san." Satsuto nodded, and Oujou pulled Natsume outside of the office.

"What the hell do you need?" Natsume demanded, but Oujou ignored him for a second, propping herself up against the wall.

"Who that was taken is dangerous?"

"You don't need me to give you facts."

"I didn't ask who was a dangerous ability student. I asked who was dangerous. You know the difference as well as anyone."

Nastume sighed. "If they can control Youichi, he'll be dangerous. Tobita Yuu generally wouldn't hurt a fly, but illusions can be dangerous if you correctly. Matsudaira Hayata is dangerous as hell, but he's stupid."

Oujou nodded. "Thanks. Once you choose all those that will be serving under you, I have full authorization to add or remove any member of your 'team'. I don't want to do that, but there are some people I don't want in the offense, and some I do."

"I get that. But don't get in my way."

Oujou nodded again, scrubbing her face with the palm of her hands until her eyes were red. "I won't. Now where's Imai?"

A smirk crossed Natsume's face. "Officially, she's in her school issued lab. Unofficially, she's in the steel-reinforced bunker she had her lunatic animal robots build directly after the invasion."

"Thanks." Oujou stuck her crutches under her armpits and began limping down the hall. Natsume followed.

When she looked back at him, he told her, "Sakura and Ruka are with her." Oujou rolled her eyes, but she let a smile cross her face as she turned back around to face the end of the drab, white hallway.

When they reached Hotaru's lab, it was empty; Natsume walked up to what looked like a regular, blank wall, pressed a hidden button, and spoke his name. A panel on the floor slid open, revealing stairs that led down into a half-lit room. Natsume headed down the stairs, and as soon as Oujou, limping, got far enough down behind him, the panel slid shut above them.

Hotaru was sitting in a chair all the way across the huge, cluttered room, staring at a computer screen, while Ruka was feeding a rat that sat in his lap and Mikan was playing with one of Hotaru's inventions.

"Imai, I have to talk to you," Oujou announced, as Natsume walked over to stand beside Mikan, who looked up and smiled at him as he approached.

Hotaru didn't react, except to say, "I'm listening."

"How good is your security system of the school?" Everyone turned to look at Oujou—except for Hotaru—at that statement. "I mean, I know you must have one. Some way to track who comes in and out, or something like that."

"And if I don't?" Now everyone turned to look at Hotaru, their heads snapping towards her as though they were watching a ball move back and forth in a tennis match; the ball was in her court now.

Oujou shrugged and turned as though about to leave. "Then I suppose you're not as good as I thought you were."

Hotaru still didn't turn around, and all eyes—except for Oujou's—remained focused on her. "I do. I can track it by what their alice is, or just by heat signatures. What do you need?"

Oujou turned back around. "Nothing right now, but I'm going to need, as of later today or tomorrow, regular updates about people passing on and off of the grounds. And you're going to hear the announcement later, but tomorrow at nine, everybody above the age of eleven is to report to the main gymnasium at nine in the morning tomorrow."

"I'll send the updates to your phone starting in an hour, for every half an hour, unless more than three people pass in or out within the span of two minutes. Good enough for you?"

Nodding, Oujou turned and limped back up the stairs.

--

"We need to discuss a few things," Oujou told Satsuto as she sat down in the chair facing his desk; he was working on his computer, but he looked up when she came in.

Satsuto nodded, interlacing his fingers in front of his chin. "I agree. What would you like to discuss first?"

"First? Sakura Mikan."

"Sakura-san? What about her?"

Oujou rolled her eyes. "Don't play dumb. You know as well as I do that she may be the most important person in this war."

"The main player, so to speak."

Oujou's eyes tightened as she spat out, "This is not a game. Don't you ever _dare_ treat it that way."

Satsuto bowed his head towards her. "I apologize. You're right. You want Sakura-san in the offense?"

"So she can be killed? No. I want to train for a long time, until she perfects her powers, and then I want her in the defense. If it comes to it, we need to be able to take out their alices."

Satsuto stared at the wall somewhere past Oujou's head, deep in thought; finally, he answered her. "That'll take out our powers, too." There was no way to tell what he was thinking.

"That's why she needs to train, so she can learn to localize her powers, target certain people. I know it's possible. My mother could do it."

A sigh came from Satsuto. "Your mother was a genius."

"I know that. But that doesn't mean Sakura can't do it."

"Then who should train her? She wouldn't be able to train with everybody else, because of the nature of her abilities."

Oujou smiled. "You."

--

Oujou perched on the corner of her bed, leaning her crutches against the mattress beside her. She took out her phone and dialed a number she knew by heart.

The person answered in one ring, with a short, crisp, "What?"

"You owe me a favor."

--

**Hi. How are you? Good? Good. I hope you liked it. There will be around ten chapters left, and then an epilogue. Please review. Thanks.**


	37. A Favor

**Hi. Please enjoy. Bye.**

_--_

_Whoever said "the pen is mightier than the sword" obviously never encountered automatic weapons._

_-Gen. Douglas MacArthur_

"_You owe me a favor."_

There was a short silence, and then Yuka let out a bark of laughter. "Why do I owe you, Oujou-chan? I protected you for most of your life."

"And then you sent my best friend to die. You owe me a favor, and I'm going to collect. Now."

There was a sharp intake of breath, and then some rustling; Yuka, Oujou guessed, had pulled the phone away from her ear and set it down somewhere. Finally, the phone was picked up again.

"What do you need?"

Good. It was easier without a lot of argument. "I need to know what's going on with the invasion."

Yuka laughed again. "You think I can tell you that?"

"If you have to."

"Oujou-chan, we're enemies. I can't just give you vital information."

_Really?_ "You owe me a favor. I need you to do this for me. Do you want more people to die?"

Yuka let out a sigh, which flooded static across the line. "No, I don't, but I also don't want to be killed." She paused, then continued. "And what the hell are you going to tell your superiors about where you got this from?"

That was a good sign—she was saying that like she was going to tell.

"I'm leading this with the headmaster of Gakuen Alice. That's not something I have to worry about right now."

There was another _long_ silence. And then, "I can't tell you much right now, but I can get back to you with more information. And you can tell your friend Hyuuga Natsume that his little companion is fine."

And then Yuka hung up.

Oujou closed her phone, then stared down at it. She smiled.

--

At promptly nine o'clock in the morning, all Gakuen Alice students above the age of 11 were standing in a grid in the auditorium, with Oujou, Satsuto, and the section leaders standing on the stage, watching them.

Oujou addressed them first. "I will be leading the training of all students. That said, I will not be training you most of the time. Your section leader will be training you. First, Hyuuga-san will choose those he will use for the offense. Then, Jinno-sensei will choose defense, Narumi-sensei will take all of the dangerous ability students left, Noda-sensei will take the rest of the special-ability students, and Yamada-sensei will take everybody else. There are a few students that I will pull out of these assigned groups later. And at any time we can and may change the group that you are in. Hyuuga-san, you may begin."

Natsume stepped forward. "Ruka, Imai Hotaru, Kokoroyomi, Kitsuneme, Mochiage, Andō Tsubasa, Harada Misaki, Ibaragi Nobara, Amane Rui, Yakumo Hajime, Tonouchi Akira, Yamanouchi Shizune, and Goshima Hijiri. I will talk to anyone else who wants to be in the offense."

Oujou frowned. She had to talk to Hotaru again, and Tonouchi Akira. She couldn't have them in the offense. That meant she also had to talk to Natsume again.

A voice whispered in her ear, startling her. "What are you thinking about?" It was Satsuto.

"I can't have Imai or Tonouchi Akira fighting. I need to talk to them later."

Hot breath blew into her ear as Satsuto though; finally, he answered with, "Call them up after this, along with anyone else you need to talk to."

And then he stepped forward and announced, "Now you know who is going where. All offense members or potential offense members report to Gym 1. All those already assigned to defense cannot try to get into offense. All defense members report to Gym 2. All dangerous ability and special ability students report to your classrooms. Everyone else report to Gym 3. And now Oujou-san has a few last words."

Oujou passed him as he stepped back and she walked in front of the microphone. "Imai Hotaru, Tonouchi Akira, and all healers are to report on stage when everybody else leaves. Now go to your assigned places."

There was a huge clamor as everybody flooded out different exits of the room. When the room cleared out, Oujou, Satsuto, and the people ordered up on the stage all stood in a clump near the microphone, which Oujou switched off. She nodded to Satsuto, who left, and then turned and faced the group.

"I will speak with Imai Hotaru first." Hotaru walked up to her, one eyebrow raised. "You're not going to be fighting."

Hotaru's calm demeanor broke, and shock showed in her eyes as they widened. "What? I can fight. I've been training with Hyuuga while you've been off doing whatever the hell you've been doing."

Really? That was an interesting development, though not all that unexpected.

"That doesn't matter. That's not my reason. I need you to be in charge of recon. Monitor radio chatter; keep track of who's on campus. We can't have you running around and getting killed. That doesn't help us."

Hotaru stared at her for a moment, though whether it was in shock or anger, Oujou wasn't sure. "At least let me train with them," she offered at last.

That was fair enough. "But for the rest of the time, instead of going to class, you will monitor things. Good?"

"Good."

"You can go now."

Hotaru left, and Oujou called up Tonouchi Akira, who was a tall, good-looking boy a few years older than her.

He smiled at her, and she knew it was completely fake. "Is there something you need me for?" he asked, and she raised an eyebrow at his feigned innocence; of course she needed him for something—if she didn't, why would she call him up?

Might as well cut to the chase. "How well can you control your _Amplification_?"

Akira actually looked moderately surprised for a moment, and then he laid a hand on Oujou's shoulder.

Emotion flooded through her—his, Satsuto's, Natsume's, Mikan's, emotions, emotions, suffocating her, raking through her body, clogging her lungs and running through her veins. Stabbing through her, like a knife driven through her one inch at a time until—

It stopped. Oujou was on the floor, her body aching from her collapse and from her convulsions. Both Akira and Subaru were kneeling down beside her, and she tried to shove herself into a sitting position, hating the looks of pity on both their faces.

"I didn't ask how strong you were," she rasped at Akira, "I asked how well you could control your powers. Never do that again."

Akira smirked a little, but nodded; he stood, and didn't offer her a hand as she struggled to stand. Subaru supported her with as minimal contact as he could manage; each time he touched her, a pang of emotion was sent through her, almost taunted her by reminding her body of what it could be suffering.

"I can make as many alice stones as you want," he told her, "and I can make my alice encompass at most about five or six feet on all sides of me. Probably more if I really tried. Ironically, my own alice stones down work on me."

If he could make alice stones, it was probably good enough for now. "Okay," Oujou decided, "you are going to continue to be part of the offense, but during your class time, you're going to make alice stones. We're going to need enough for at least all of the offense and defense people and all of the healers."

Akira smiled sardonically and bowed. "Of course."

He left, and Oujou called up Subaru, who had been hovering anxiously about five feet away. "Are you feeling okay?" Subaru asked before Oujou could get a word in; laughed a little, breathy laugh.

"Am I okay? That's a stupid question. I'm never okay. That doesn't matter. I need you to be in charge of the healers. Train them, do whatever."

Subaru's eyebrows rose, and he frowned at her. "Those are your orders?"

Did she stutter? "Yes, those are my orders. Now take your healers, go to infirmary seven or wherever you want to practice, and get them training. By tomorrow, I'm going to want at least one healer on standby. I want _you_ constantly on standby. During the day. At night, if possible, I want at least one healer awake. Preferably not the same one everyday. I don't care who as long as they're competent."

Subaru nodded and, when dismissed, herded all of the healers out of the room, leaving Oujou standing alone in the auditorium. She adjusted her crutches, then left the room, limping towards Gym 1, where Natsume was beginning to get all of the Offense members together. She was under orders by Satsuto to give a talk to every group about what was coming up.

When she reached the Gym, she entered and saw a line of teens—many of them ones he hadn't called up—with Natsume standing ramrod straight in front of them.

They all looked at her when she entered, and then Natsume nodded to her. "Oujou-san," he muttered, then turned back to face his troops.

"I'm supposed to give you a pep talk," Oujou told the group, "but that's not going to happen. I'm not going to tell you that everything's going to go perfectly well, etcetera, etcetera, etcetera. That is untrue. You are our front line. You need to be as strong—physically and with your alice—as possible. I don't care if you go to sleep bruised every night, and bleeding half the time. I've done that. If you have the unlimited alice type, you are to inform me immediately. As in, now."

Nobody made a move, so she just walked up towards them, rested her weight partially on her crutches, and began speaking again. "How many of you think you can fight?" All of the hands raised, Natsume's excluded; he seemed to be just watching. "How many of you think you can last five minutes against me?" About half of the hands dropped, though none of them were from those that Natsume had called up. "How many of you think you can last ten minutes against me." Now, even more hands dropped, so she smirked and asked the final question. "How many of you think you can last ten minutes against Hyuuga-san?"

Every hand dropped except for Hotaru's, and she kept it up even against the stares from the rest of the inhabitance of the room.

Finally, Natsume said, "You've only lasted seven minutes, Imai."

That was surprising, but not completely unexpected—Oujou had guessed that Hotaru would be good at fighting. "If I used my inventions, I would last longer."

"If I used my alice, it would lost not nearly as long. Put your hand down, Imai."

Another girl stepped forward, tossed her hair behind her shoulder, and announced, "I don't get why we have to do this."

"Then get out," Oujou told her, then focused her attention back on Hotaru, who seemed to be competing in a staring contest with Natsume.

But the girl didn't move, and instead shot back, "I mean, this seems so stupid. A _war_? An _invasion_? That's so ridiculous."

"Then _get out_. You weren't called here. You can go to the main section if you want. If you don't want to be here, _get out_."

The girl took a few more steps towards Oujou, stopping when she was only a few feet away. "I mean that this whole _thing_ is ridiculous. Why the hell do we need to learn how to fight?"

Oujou finally tore her gaze away from Hotaru and Natsume and focused on the girl, who was standing with her weight leaned towards one side, her hand on her hip. "We are doing this because if we don't, everyone in this school will either be taken, or killed."

"Yeah, right. They won't kill children. People don't kill children."

"_Yeah, right_," Oujou mimicked, making her voice higher to match the girl's. "People do kill children. Now if you don't want to be in this group, get out."

"Whatever. I mean, this is the only group that's interesting. I mean, the other one's are just, like, '_here, let's do this now._' That's so _boring_."

"So you want something that's interesting, but you don't want to do work. You have to do something."

"Why?"

"Because, as I said, if you don't, you will die."

"And, like I said, that's stupid."

Oujou pointed to herself, waving her hand as though to encompass her entire being. "I don't have to be here. I have enough injuries that I could get out of this in a heartbeat. I have been shot multiple times. I could, literally, get out of this by just asking. But I'm not, because everyone needs to work, and I am included. If you think I'm going to stop working because I _don't want to_, then you are so much more of an idiot than I originally thought you were."

"You bitch," the girl snarled at her. "You're the stupid one. If you can get out of this, why don't you get out, and stop bothering us."

Oujou kicked out at her, her leg catching the girl in the face and sending her flying backwards nearly ten feet. And then Oujou spun and walked out of the room, limping heavily.

The girl's nose was bleeding heavily, and she swore under her breath as she struggled to sit up. "What the hell is her problem?" she spat out, coughing blood out of her mouth.

"You're stupid."

--

**Hi again. Please review. Bye again.**


	38. Training

**Hi again. Sorry I took so long. I wish I hadn't. Actually, the only reason I finished was that I was home sick today, because yesterday at about 6 p.m., I had a fever of 100.5, and we have to wait 24 hours **_**after**_** the fever has gone away to go back to school.**

--

_I have had a dream, past the wit of man to say what dream it was.  
__-William Shakespeare, A Midsummer Night's Dream_

When Oujou entered the gym where Narumi was working with the remaining Dangerous Ability students—sans Mikan, of course—none of them looked at her. They all continued with their Alice training, and only Narumi walked over to her, nodding to her, his purple eyes meeting her black ones.

"Hello, Oujou-san. I suppose you need to speak to your troops." He smiled a little, to soften his words, but she frowned. Her troops. She hated that. They shouldn't be her troops. Narumi spun, and called to all of the ones in his group. "Line up. Now."

The all lined up, with seemingly no order, until she realized it was in order by skill. They seemed slightly uneven, and then she figured it was because of the ones that were in the other groups were mainly on the right side, the side for the stronger ones.

"What do you want to tell them?" Narumi asked, and she grimaced again, then blanked out her face, trying to hide her annoyance.

"I can speak for myself. There are rules that every person is going to follow. As soon as the fighting starts, or even during training, nobody can fight for more than four hours straight. After that, you must take at least an hour long break. For anyone with the unlimited alice type or who's underage, you must take an hour long break every three hours. Other than Hyuuga and I, there are _no _exceptions.

"Who has the unlimited alice type here?" A few of them raised their hands, and she swore under her breath. How could so many of them have ended up in the dangerous ability class? They were the ones that fought the most. "All of you are getting anti-unlimited alice drugs. _All_ of you. This time there are no exceptions, and no arguments. You will be the line between the defense and the main group. If everything works out, you will not have to fight. That is unlikely. Your job is to keep the other groups from having to fight."

One of them stepped forward, stood completely straight as though at attention, and announced. "That makes no sense."

He sounded ridiculous, announcing that as though it was the most important thing in the world, but Oujou felt no urge to laugh. "We want as few people to die as possible. All of you are more qualified to fight than nearly anyone else. We need to keep as many people as possible from dying. That is your job. That is the job of all of us. Any questions?"

Another person stepped forward, as the boy stepped back. "What do we get for doing this?"

"Nothing. You get absolutely nothing. Any other questions?" When nobody else asked something, she gathered her crutches under her armpits and began walking out of the room, but Narumi stopped her by grabbing one of her crutches, gripping it until she couldn't pull it away.

"Are we fighting this alone? Are reinforcements coming?" Oujou spun, pivoting on one of her crutches—the one he wasn't holding—so she could face him.

"They are."

Narumi nodded. "Who?"

"That's need to know."

Grimacing, Narumi shoved back his hair out of his amethyst eyes, fingering something in his pocket. "And who needs to know?"

She knew he was probing for an answer, but she wanted to see how much he knew. "Headmaster Satsuto and I."

"Not Highmaster Geier?"

"Only Headmaster Satsuto and I."

"When did you meet the Safehouse people?"

So he did know. She wasn't really all that surprised; in fact, that might actually be helpful. "When did _you _meet them?"

For half a second, Narumi looked surprised, but he closed his eyes, then turned around and paced away, then back. "I met Sakiro a while ago. Yeah, we…uh, met. I'm not involved with them. I mean, not really." He looked uncomfortable, but she knew that prying wouldn't get them anywhere.

"I met her. And yes, supposedly, they are going to be our backups. Supposedly. I don't know what's going on. If you have any way to really communicate with them, please tell me. Because I need to wait for them to contact me, and waiting is _not_ something that we can afford."

Narumi continued to fiddle with whatever was in his pocket, and his other fist clenched. "I'll see. I'm not sure. If you want to train with us, you're welcome to."

She knew that, and so she just nodded, then spun again and left the room.

He knew. How had he found out? Oujou was pretty sure they didn't just spill their secret for any random person, especially a person from Gakuen Alice, so how did he know?

For the moment, it didn't matter; all that mattered was that he had a connection to them.

--

When Oujou entered Satsuto's office, he was going over papers from a stack on his desk; every once in a while, he rubbed his eyes, and finally, he pulled a contact out of each eye and laid his head down on the desk, the contacts still on his fingertips.

When she sat in the chair, the emotions coursing through him hit her like a sledgehammer, and she groaned. Frustration. Exhaustion. Longing. Sadness.

"I'm going to need to train, too," Oujou told him, and he looked up, brushing his contacts off of his fingers into the garbage can sitting beside his desk.

Satsuto nodded, rubbing his eyes with the back of his hands. His exhaustion spiked. "Train with me."

"What was the last time you slept?" She was not training with a half-dead headmaster who was likely to pass out without her even using her alice.

Satsuto's mouth twisted, and his hands froze on his face, and then he slumped his head down on one hand. "Dunno. How 'bout you?"

"I'm on caffeine pills. You never answered my question." Exasperation spiked, then exhaustion blanketed over it. "I can feel how tired you are. You can't lead us if you can't focus."

"I can focus," he muttered. "And if necessary, you can give me more energy."

"No, I can't. Even if I wanted to."

Satsuto blinked a few times. "What do you mean?"

Was he kidding? Did he really not understand? "I can spare enough energy to keep you awake for longer than a few minutes. Between being worn down by my alice, and the amount of time I've been awake, I'd be lucky if it just knocked me out cold for a while."

"Oh." Satsuto flinched. "Okay. You need to get some sleep, too. And we can train later."

"You need to sleep, too. I can make you."

"Don't waste your alice on me. And..." he paused, his eyes flitting around the room, "you haven't really used it since we left Sa—the place. We don't really know what's going to happen."

Oujou shook her head. "Nothing's going to happen. Nothing that isn't supposed to, at least. I know how to use my powers."

"You need to sleep now."

"So do you."

In response, Satsuto just laid his head down on the desk, then reached over his arm and patted the other side of the desk, just in front of where she was sitting. Smiling, Oujou set her head down her hair brushing against his, and within minutes, they were both asleep.

--

_There was fire everywhere, flames licking through trees, sparkles flying up towards the smoke-filled, cloudy sky. Children, dressed in black, some carrying guns, ran in all directions, the flames licking around all of them._

_Oujou stood in the center, completely still, helpless against the force that was holding her rooted in place. She couldn't move, couldn't even lift her foot to take a step. She was helpless._

_Blood splattered across her face, turning the vision of her right eye red, throwing a filter across her field of view._

_People raced around her, as though she wasn't there, bullets whizzing over her head and beside her. Shouts rang out through the open field._

_She couldn't move._

_Faces loomed in front of her, unidentifiable faces with featured that blurred the longer she stared at them. They were faces of children, blooded and bruised, cut and scarred and mangled._

_Hands grasped at her body, voices begged for help, but she couldn't help them, could even blink. She couldn't even take their hands, couldn't even shove them off._

_She couldn't do anything._

_Anything._

_She was useless._

_Emotions flew through her, pain, so much pain, agony, fear, terror, throbbing wounds slashing against her, dragging her down, until she couldn't breathe, until she couldn't see. But she could. Sights, colors, movements, but she couldn't see._

_This was all her fault._

--

**Did you like it? I have about three or four more of the preparation, and then some number for the war, and then I have the epilogue.**


	39. The Call

**Hi. Sorry for taking so long. I really didn't mean to. I promise. And this chapter sucks. I have to warn you beforehand. Natsume almost completely lost his personality in this chapter. I wrote it all wrong, and it's pissing me off, but I just want to post this and get done with it. I hope you enjoy it.**

--

_Time is the substance from which I am made. Time is a river which carries me along, but I am the river; it is a tiger that devours me, but I am the tiger; it is a fire that consumes me, but I am the fire._

_-Jorge Luis Borges_

"Headmaster-san!" Satsuto spun to the sound of Natsume's voice, and saw the black-haired boy running towards him. "I need to talk to Oujou-san. Where is she?"

When Natsume reached him, Satsuto shook his head, saying, "You can't disturb her. What do you need?"

Natsume took in a deep breath, shoving a lock of hair out of his eyes, then leaned against the nearest wall. "It's for her. Where is she?"

"Sleeping."

Natsume rolled his eyes. "She isn't in her room. Where is she? Wake her up."

"No." Natsume opened his mouth to speak, but Satsuto cut him off. "I'm not going to let you bother her at this moment. She needs rest. It's been days since she's slept, and for right now, she is going to rest."

"So it's because you don't want to disturb your precious protégé? We don't have time for this." He shoved off of the wall, but Satsuto caught his arm; Natsume clearly restrained himself from reacting and attacking him instinctively, but the effort showed on his face. "Let go of me."

Satsuto shoved him back up against the wall, but didn't move too close to him; he knew that if he crowded Natsume, Natsume would attack, and it wouldn't go well. "Listen to me, then. She is most likely not going to sleep for days after this, and we need her functioning."

"Waking her up right won't keep her from sleeping again."

"Yes, it will," Satsuto retorted. "You know as well as I do that she isn't going to go back to sleep if she has a choice. And you owe this to her."

"That's bull." Natsume shoved back against Satsuto, but Satsuto held him against the wall, leaning his weight against him with his arms outstretched, his hands pressed up against Natsume's chest. "Get the hell off of me."

"No. You owe her. She didn't want to fight in this war."

Natsume shoved against Satsuto again, and this time Satsuto let himself be pushed back an inch. "Her choice. You know you can't force her to do anything she doesn't want to do. You're not a lunatic, so I know you know that."

Satsuto sighed, backing away a few steps, then spinning and leaning back against the wall next to Natsume. "I lied to her."

"Holy shit," Natsume muttered. "You lied to Oujou and she didn't catch you?" He froze, then turned his eyes to look at him. "What did you lie about?"

"That Sakura-san would be taken away from here and put in the German branch of Gakuen Alice, the one solely for dangerous-ability students. That I would put in a good word if she helped lead this war."

"You bastard," he whispered. "You would have let her be just sent to that goddamn school if she hadn't agreed to it? You filthy bastard."

Fire coated Natsume's hand, and he shoved it against Satsuto's chest, burning a hole in Satsuto's shirt. Satusto waited a moment before pushing Natsume away. "No. I wouldn't have. I didn't. High-master Geier mentioned it, and I convinced him not to. So no. But I needed her to help in this war. I need her to."

"So you're just a pathetic liar."

"Yes," Satsuto shouted. "Yes, I am just a pathetic liar." And then his voice quieted. "But I did it to save a lot of lives."

Natsume hesitated a moment, his expression going blank, before responding. "So you're just going to let her live with this guilt?"

"No." Satsuto looked down, closing her eyes. "No. I'm going to let her die with this guilt."

"What?"

Satsuto sighed. "She's dying. She knows she's dying, and you know she's dying. She's dying a lot faster than you are. A hell of a lot faster. As she's said many times, she isn't going to live through this war."

"So you're just messing with her."

Satsuto's eyes opened, and they flared at Natsume as he hissed, "No, I'm saving lives." His voice rose again, angry, harsh. "I'm saving all of our goddamn lives."

"Not hers."

"I would if I could. I can't. I can't save her, but I can save us, and so that's the choice I have to make."

"BS. That's BS. You wouldn't save her."

This time, Satsuto grabbed Natsume's shirt and set it on fire, burning a large hole in it. "How dare you. I would save her. I would save her. You can't say that. I'm not the heartless, cold bastard you think I am. I actually do care about people. I care about her a hell of a lot more than you think I do, and a hell of a lot more than you do."

Nastume shoved him away, and would have attacked Satsuto if a voice hadn't come up from behind them; the anger was clear in his eyes, and there was a glow in them that wasn't natural, but from his alice.

"What the hell is going on here?" Oujou's voice came from behind them, and they both turned to look at her as she stalked towards her; her eyes flitting from Satsuto's burned shirt to Natsume's burned shirt. "Are you two just little children? What the hell are you doing? Do you really think it raises the morale of anyone if you stand around bickering like five-year-olds?"

Satsuto walked up to her, touching her on the shoulder; she flinched away from him, and he didn't try to touch her again. "It's not important."

Her eyes flickered to the gaping hole in his shirt, and then she smirked a little at him. "I can see this. Can you tell me what's so important that you have to be attacking each other in the middle of the hallway?"

"Nothing." Natsume walked up to her, tearing his shirt down the middle so it hung loose against his chest instead of sitting on his chest with a giant, round hole in it. "I need to talk to you." He glanced at Satsuto, then back at her. "Alone."

Oujou nodded, then walked past Satsuto to Natsume, who led her down the hall to the room that had been designated his office. It was completely empty. "What do you need?" she asked, and Natsume grinned.

"Other than to strangle that self-righteous bastard?" Oujou grimaced at him, and his smile fell away. "You have a message from someone."

"Who?"

Natsume's face fell into a frustrated grimace. "No idea. It's an alice. Won't let me remember. You apparently know who it is, though, so…you have a message. They want you to call them today." He paused, then frowned. "Actually, it was a guy who said that. He sounded like a teenager, but that could have just been the reception of the phone."

Safehouse. "I'll call them now. How's training going?"

He looked down at his hands for a moment, and she realized that he had at least five band-aids on them. "They're getting better, especially the DA class. But it's not fast enough, and we don't have enough information. They need to learn how to counter different alices, but there are so many alices that there's no way to cover them all."

"Okay." Oujou nodded, tying up her hair in a quick ponytail, then pulling her phone out of her pocket and flipping it open. "Can I use this room to call them privately?" she asked him, and he smiled sardonically at him.

"You're the boss." He left the room, and Oujou searched through her contact list of the number that she knew was programmed into it.

And sure enough, it was right there, under the name "Jason Evans". He picked up on the first ring. "Oujou," he greeted her. "We have a group that is willing to aide your school in fighting the AAO's invasion."

There had to be a catch to that. "How small is it?" They weren't going to send a huge group to help them. Safehouse hated them. They stood against Gakuen Alice and all it was and all it did and all it stood for.

He sighed. "Ten of us. That's the best we can do. There's another we're trying to get, but it's unlikely."

"Why is it unlikely?"

"She's been on the run for a long time. She knows exactly how to cover her tracks, and if she doesn't want to be found, we're going to have a hell of a time finding her."

That sounded mildly ominous. "Who is it?"

"Ninari Misa. The one with _Death Return_. She's been on the run since she escaped Gakuen Alice after they tried to kill her. She's brilliant, and she's good enough to kill any of us."

That made sense. "But she'll be an asset to us if she helps us."

It wasn't a question, but Jason answered anyway. "Yes. But more than likely, she's not going to help. We'll arrive in four days."

Oujou was, for a second, confused by the rapid change in topic, but then she understood. "How do we know that it'll we four days before the invasion?"

"We have intelligence that says it'll be approximately a week. Be prepared."

And then he hung up.

"Great," Oujou sighed. "Just great."

--

**Almost done. Well, kind of. Probably 2 more prep chapters left, and then 5-10 for the invasion, then the epilogue. And then I'm done. And eventually, I'll rewrite it. Please review.**


	40. Reinforcements

**Sorry. I had a ton of homework, but now I'm done with my midterms, so I have no more intensive studying for a while. I actually got a 90% on my Precalc midterms, which is awesome.**

--

_People aren't afraid of being dead, they're afraid of getting dead._

_~George Carlin_

"Five more times!" Natsume shouted at the offense group, then turned to face Oujou, snapping, "What?"

Oujou pulled him farther over to the side, then spoke to him in a hushed voice. "Reinforcements are coming in four days, but they aren't from GA. You are not going to question them. It doesn't matter where they're from. It doesn't matter what they do. None of that is your business."

"Why the f—"

Oujou cut him off. "It isn't your business. It's my problem. If you have a problem with them, come to me. They will be directly under my command, unless I say otherwise."

He sighed, glanced over at the offense group to check how their drills were going, then looked back over at her. "How many are coming?"

"Ten. Possibly eleven."

"You don't know?" She gave him a look, and he sighed again. There were stress lines at the corners of his eyes, and he had dark bags under them. "Not my business. Yeah, I get it. Are they any good?"

She leaned against the wall. She was off her crutches, but she still had a limp, and she rested her bad foot against the wall so she didn't have to put any weight on it. "One is. I don't know the rest of them. They probably are."

The movement from behind him paused, and so Natsume spun to see what was going on; most of them were staring at him, and Mikan, who had been training with them when she wasn't training with Satsuto, looked miserable. And jealous.

"Did you finish your five times?" he shouted at them, and they all jumped. Most of them, anyway. But they didn't move until he glared at them; then, they jumped back into action, and he turned back to look at Oujou.

Oujou smiled wanly, then leaned completely back against the wall. "You have to rest too, you know."

Natsume blinked once, then twice, a small, sad smile growing on his face. "I can't. Not till this whole thing is done with."

"You're important to our cause. You need to make sure you aren't exhausted when we need you the most."

Natsume let out a short, barking laugh. "Yeah, you're one to talk. I'll start resting once you do."

"That's different." When Natsume raised an eyebrow, clearly looking for an elaboration, she continued. "I'm not helping with anything. I don't—"

"Bull. That's bull. You're helping more than that pansy boyfriend of yours is."

"He's not my boyfriend, and he's not a pansy. He's the one that's actually running this thing. He's just making me 'help' so he won't feel as bad when he screws up."

"Are you blind or just a moron. You're helping with all of the training. I've seen you work with the kids when they screw up. It's not like you're just screwing up. And you're going to be doing more during the actual fighting."

Oujou's expression twisted for a moment, and then she cleared it. "We're talking about you, not me. Anyway, when the reinforcements come, I'll introduce you to them. They are…different."

"Why isn't anyone from the other Gas coming?"

Good question. "No idea. Ask the headmaster if you're really curious."

"You don't care?"

"I don't have time to care. It just means that we have to work harder. I can't do anything about it." She shoved off from the wall and began walking towards the exit; Natsume watched her go, a frown on his face.

--

Three days later, there was a meeting for all of the troops—all of the students above the age of twelve. All those old enough to fight. The air was laden with tension, and many of the students sported bruises on their faces, arms, and hands from the sparring they had been doing.

Natsume stared at Mikan, noting her particularly nasty black eye. He had tried to convince her to go to the healers to get it looked at, because her eyes was swelling shut, but she had insisted that she was fine.

They weren't ready. Some of the offense was, and the dangerous ability class was, but the rest of the students weren't. They were going to die. That was it.

Oujou stepped up to speak, and Natsume turned his attention to her. He was actually interested in hearing what she was going to say. How could she reassure the troops that they were going to win?

Because he sure as hell didn't know how to.

"We have less than a week," she began. Okay, not all that reassuring. "And there's something I think most of you don't understand. You're going to have to kill."

What the hell was she doing?

"I don't just mean stepping on bugs. I don't mean killing a spider. I mean killing a living, breathing person. And I'm telling you this because you aren't ready. When you kill someone for the first time, you're probably going to freeze up. You can't. If you freeze up, you're dead. And the person who kills you isn't going to hesitate and allow someone to kill them."

Natsume understood what she was doing, but he wasn't sure if this was going to help or hurt. And then he was struck with another thought, one he should have had long ago.

Mikan.

Mikan's innocence was going to be lost in this battle. She was going to have to kill, just like everybody else, and she wasn't going to know how to handle it.

"I don't want any of you to have to kill." Her eyes met his, and held it for so long that he had to look away. "But there's no other option. You are either going to have to kill or you'll die. And your innocence isn't worth much compared to your life."

She lost her innocence when she killed her parents all those years ago. The same day he lost his burning their village down. He supposed it was his fault.

It wasn't an uncommon feeling to him. He felt that way most days.

Especially when he was looking at Mikan's injuries.

"Reinforcements _are_ coming. It is not hopeless. No matter what happens, remember that. I wish things were different, but they aren't, so we must be prepared. Thank you." She turned and walked away from the podium, and as the students streamed out of the auditorium, Natsume approached her.

"Nice speech," he told him, and her expression twisted.

"Yeah," Oujou muttered. "I'm giving them hope when I shouldn't be. I have no right."

"Bullshit." When Oujou stared up at him in what looked almost like a mixture between amusement and amazement, he continued. "Not only is this your job, you're saving a lot of their lives. So lay off this stupid pity party and get on with it. This isn't just your right. It's your responsibility."

Oujou laughed. "I think you're getting blunter as you get older."

"Doesn't really apply when you're fourteen."

"You're still getting older."

Natsume opened his mouth to respond, but at that moment, Oujou's phone rang, and a second later, Natsume felt a vibrating from his own phone in his pocket. Both answered at the same time; the person on the other end of Natsume's was Ruka. He sounded upset.

"What is it?" Natsume demanded, and he heard Oujou ask a similar think to whomever she was talking to.

"_There are intruders," _Ruka told him, and Natsume heard Hotaru telling that to someone in the background.

"How many?"

Ruka paused. "Eleven."

"Shit. Okay. I'm going to mobilize people. Got to go." Natsume snapped the phone shut and pulled out the radio to begin giving orders. He heard Oujou's conversation with the person she was talking to—probably Hotaru—as he give his message to the other section leaders.

"What are their alices?" There was a pause, presumably as the other person answered. "_Two _God alices? Okay. They're—shit, _what?_ I have to go." And then Oujou closed her phone and turned to face Natsume. "Pull everyone back. Tell them not to engage. They're the reinforcements. Shit." And then she took off running towards the exit, and Natsume relayed her orders as he followed after her.

When they reached the outside perimeter, Natsume spotted eleven people standing directly inside the gate, waiting.

"Took you a while," one of them told her; it was the boy that Natsume had spoken to on the phone.

Oujou smiled at him. "You're early."

The boy stepped forward, and Natsume tensed. Even though Oujou claimed that these people were their allies, Natsume didn't trust them. If he wasn't allowed to know anything about them, he wasn't going to trust them.

"You're friend here's getting nervous." The blond told Oujou, then turned towards Natsume. "I'm not going to hurt her," he said, "and I'm not going to hurt you. I'm on your side." And then, smoothly, he turned his attention back to Oujou. "We found who we were looking for. This is Ninari Misa."

--

**They're here. Finally. I'm so happy.**


	41. Kissing

**Hi. I didn't mean to take this long to post. But this chapter is my longest of all of them. So I hope that makes up for it.**

_--_

_Kissing is like drinking saltwater: you drink and your thirst increases._

_~Chinese proverb_

"_We found who we were looking for. This is Ninari Misa."_

Oujou nodded to the person Jason was gesturing towards. The woman was tall and lean, dressed in a tight black shirt and tight jeans, with about eight piercings in her face; one was in her lip, three were in her eyebrow, and two were in each ear. Her hair was short, spiky, and black, with pale, died tips.

Oujou stuck out her hand, and Ninari Misa eyed it for a moment before saying, "I'm not going to touch you. Don't even try."

"Good." Oujou smiled. "I wasn't really looking forward to trying to touch you."

Ninari nodded, then turned to look at Jason; they had a brief conversation in English that included Oujou's name, and then Jason started talking to Oujou. "You're in charge of us for this operation. We do not report to Headmaster Satsuto. You will choose a second in command. That person cannot be Headmaster Satsuto, because we do not report to the school. If for any reason you are unable to lead us, command of us will go directly to the second in command, and he or she will not be under the command of Headmaster Satsuto or Highmaster Geier. I will know. Believe me."

Oujou nodded. "I understand. We have a room set up, and rooms for you to stay in. Please follow me."

She began leading them back towards the building with Natsume following behind when her phone rang, she picked up, and immediately Hotaru began speaking. "Who the hell are these people? One of them has Voice Pheromone. Two have God alices. They're not from GA."

She knew. Oujou didn't know how the hell Hotaru knew that they weren't from GA, but she wasn't surprised. "They're not, and I can't get into it. Come up to the headquarters we set up. You can meet them there."

It cut off with a snap as Hotaru ended the call. Oujou turned to face the group of people who were following her; they all looked stoic, and Natsume was eyeing Jason suspiciously.

Jason grimaced for a moment, then cleared his expression and turned to look at Ninari, beginning a conversation with her in English. Oujou watched them for a moment, then looked at the other people who had come. Mikaru was there, along with eight people that she didn't know. Six were male, between the ages of about 15 and 25, and two were female, both clearly under 18 years of age.

One was wearing sunglasses, which was odd considering that it was overcast out, but it was clear that the girl wasn't blind—she was having no trouble maneuvering around.

"What are your alices?" Oujou asked then, spinning around so she could watch them and walk backwards so she could talk to them. Three of them tensed and didn't look like they were going to answer, so she continued, "I need to know so I can figure out where you would do the most good."

The girl in sunglasses sighed and answered, "I will not be helpful for offense. I am purely useful for recon. I can find every person within a wide range of sight and, by looking at them, tell all alices they have."

After that, one of the boys, with short brown hair cut into a buzz cut, answered, "I can trigger nerves in a person's body, and my wounds heal about ten times as fast as regular ones do."

"I can shift my body into other forms, though I can only speed my healing to about double the speed of regular people." That was a boy who looked as though he was the youngest. He was medium height, with short blond hair that was hanging in his eyes.

The other girl spoke now. "I can shift the perception of what people experience, which is not the same as illusion, and I can control minds to an extent."

"What do you mean by 'to an extent'?"

"I can control, at most, between fifty an a hundred people, depending on who I'm controlling, and whether I have an alice enhancer stone. I need some amount of concentration, and if they move too far outside of my radius, I can't control them."

"How much control do you have over them?"

The girl smiled a little. "Let's just say that Reo of the AAO won't be a problem anymore."

--

"Do you understand our agreement?" Satsuto and Jason were standing in the corner of the room, and Jason's expression was aggravated. "You aren't in charge of us. I don't care how important you are to the school; you are only a nuisance to us."

"I understand. We—" He broke off as there was a loud crash from the other side of the room; both of them spun around to see what was going on.

Oujou was laying on the ground, convulsing, her fingers scrambling on the ground, her entire body writhing on the floor. Satsuto raced over to her and was about to grab her shoulders to restrain her when Jason's voice rang out to him. "Don't touch her."

It was an order that Satsuto knew not to argue with, and within seconds, Jason was beside him, shoving him away, explaining as he moved. "Her body's locking down, and you touching her will overload her system. Move the hell out of the way."

Satsuto backed up a step, then turned to grab his radio to call for a healer. "Stop." He froze again. "Healers won't be able to touch her any more than you'll be able to. Just move the hell out of my way and let me help her."

Satusto moved out of the way, watching as Jason laid a hand on her stomach and a hand on her forehead. Immediately, she stilled, and Jason turned her head to the side. He began murmuring to her English, the words too low for Satsuto to make out.

After a moment, Oujou began whimpering, her hands clenching into fists and then relaxing over and over again, her lips tightening and relaxing, the muscles in her arms and legs contracting and relaxing.

"Ssh," Jason murmured. "Ssh. Relax. I can make you go to sleep, but I want you to try to relax on your own." Her fists clenched again, tight, her nails cutting into her skin, but the rest of her stopped moving, stilling completely.

Jason smiled a little. "You aren't relaxing. I know you can hear me, and I know you can understand me. I know you think that you can't control your body, but you just need to stop fighting yourself and fighting me."

Everybody was staring at them, and when Jason shot a glare at the rest of the people in the room, they all looked away. Satsuto knew that she wouldn't want everyone staring at her. She had pride. A lot of it.

"Relax your muscles. Your feet. Your legs. You can stop the shaking." He began running one of his hands over the leg closer to him, and Oujou slowly sank into the ground, relaxing more. "Your chest. Your arms." His hand moved to her arm. "Your neck. You face. Your hands."

Slowly, her hands unclenched, and a beads of blood welled up from the cuts that her fingernails had cut into her hands.

"You're going to sleep," he told him. "Don't try to fight me, because it will do you absolutely no good. And it will only frustrate you."

Oujou's head started to turn so her face was up, but Jason held her in place, then closed his eyes for a moment. Oujou's body went limp.

Jason sighed, then turned to face Satsuto, who was staring at the two of them. "I need a cot brought in here. She'll get at least four hours of sleep. I'd keep her asleep for longer, but we just don't have time." Satsuto nodded, then barked an order into the radio.

Within minutes, a cot was dragged into the room; Jason lifted Oujou up and set her down on the cot, then sat down on the floor next to the cot, resting his head against the side of it.

Without looking at Satsuto, Jason asked, "You hate that, don't you? That I can touch her, and you can't."

"Shut up."

"You really do hate it. That I could be with her, if she wanted me. That me touching her doesn't hurt her, while it hurt her for you to touch her. For you to even be near her."

"Shut up." His fist crashed against the wall, and then he swore under his breath. "Shut the hell up."

A soft, hoarse laugh came out of Jason's mouth. "I don't want her. Believe me, I don't want her. Not like that."

He sounded exhausted, and he looked really young, curled up next to her cot, his head leaning on the side of it.

"How long does she have?"

Jason sighed. "On the current trend? Six months at the most."

"What about anti-alice drugs?" Satsuto sounded like he was begging.

"At this point, they can only make it easier for her until she dies. Her body's too deteriorated."

There was a moment of semi-silence—neither of them spoke, but there was noise from all around them from the others in the room—and then Satsuto asked, almost hesitantly, "Do you—"

"I'm not a goddamn psychic," Jason shot at him before he could finish his sentence. "Don't ask me to look into things. I'm not a goddamn psychic. When she wakes up, make her eat. If she won't, get me. I'm going to go look at the troops."

And then he stood and stalked out of the room without letting Satsuto respond.

--

Oujou was relaxed. She didn't know the last time she had felt like this.

But she had to get up and go back to work. Not something she was looking forward to.

When she managed to pry her heavy eyelids up, she saw the ceiling of the designated operations center staring back down at her, the crack she had found earlier directly above her head. And then everything that had happened came back to her in a flurry of images.

Her writhing around on the floor, Jason putting her to sleep.

"Oujou?" It was Satsuto's voice, relieved, but unhappy. "Are you awake?"

"Does it look like I'm still sleeping?" Her voice sounded relaxed, and she could barely bring herself to infuse any amount of annoyance into it. "How long have I been out?"

While she waited for him to answer, she sat up and swung her legs out of bed, starting to stand up; immediately, Satsuto raced over to her, grabbing her arms to brace her weight. A jolt of pain shot through her head, and she collapsed back on the cot, jerking away from him.

"Don't touch me," she muttered. "How long have I been out?"

He sighed and dropped down on the bed next to her, his head falling into his hands. "Four hours. You need to eat."

There was a bowl of soup sitting on a table beside the cot, and he picked it up, trying to hand it to her, but she shook her head, not taking it.

"I need to be brought up to speed. I don't have time to eat. What are the reinforcements doing?" There were people in the room who didn't know about Safehouse, and she couldn't let any of them hear about it.

"Eat and then I'll talk to you."

But Oujou stood again, avoiding his grabbing hand, and walked over to one of the computers. Satsuto swore under his breath and asked for Jason on the radio, but she ignored him, picking up a radio headset and switching to Natsume's channel.

"What's happened in the past four hours?" she asked him, and a minute later, he came back with his response.

"Not much. We've had three broken arms today, and apparently eight broken fingers. The offense is doing well, but we aren't ready."

Oujou was about to respond when Jason stalked into the room, looking murderous. "I have to go."

She took off the headset as Jason came over to her and shoved the bowl of soup into her hands. "You will eat," he told her, "or I swear to God, I will force-feed you. We can't have you passing out in the middle of this."

She swore under her breath. "I don't have time to eat right now. I need to be brought up to speed. You shouldn't have made me sleep for that long."

Jason's expression was completely flat. "Sit." Oujou's knees went out from under her and she sat in the chair beside her, the soup splashing up from the bowl and then back into it. "You will eat." Oujou shook her head. "Do you want me to force you to? Because I will if you make me. Right now, you do _not_ want to screw with me. We are not letting anyone get injured because you're delirious from not eating."

Oujou grimaced, then picked up the spoon and began eating robotically, with Jason standing above her. When she was halfway through, she put the spoon down in the bowl and began to set it down next to the computer; Jason's voice stopped her. "You will _finish _eating. I'm not going to let you starve yourself."

"I'm not hungry."

Jason laughed a little bitterly. "You can't lie to me. Now eat. And if you insist on continuing to fight me because you want to remain in control, I will take control away from you completely and believe me, you will _not_ enjoy that."

She put the bowl back on her lap and picked up the spoon, putting more soup into her mouth. "I would dare you to," she told him finally, "but I know that you can."

He nodded. "I can. You need to take some anti-Unlimited-alice pills now, or your body is more than likely going to shut down again. And you have an hour before you're needed, so you're not going to do anything for that hour."

Oujou grimaced, standing up; they were so close that they were practically pressed against each other. "I have work to do. You can't keep me from it."

Jason shoved her back down onto the chair, leaning over her. "At the moment, your body is fighting to keep you from completely breaking down. If you give yourself an hour of calm, I'll be able to help your body. I can't help you if you decide to start running around like a moron."

Sighing, she closed her eyes for a moment. When she opened them, they were calm; most of the anger was gone from them. "Fine. Then can I ask you something?" He nodded, so she stood again and began speaking into his ear.

After a moment, he nodded. "I can do both. But the second—I can only give you ten minutes."

"That's fine."

"Sit down, then." She sat back down in the chair, and he leaned forward, pressing his fingers to her forehead; her body completely stilled and then, after a moment, she gasped.

"Holy shit," Oujou muttered, "I'm blind."

Jason stepped away from her just as Satsuto came running up; his eyes were worried, and he crouched down next to Oujou, asking, "What's wrong? What did he do?"

Oujou slowly turned her gaze to him. She couldn't feel him. She couldn't feel any of them.

All of the emotions in the world, except for hers, were gone from her mind. She was free.

"I need to talk to you," she told him, and immediately he nodded; she stood from the chair and they walked out of the room and across the hall to his office. When they got inside, Oujou closed the door and switched on the lights. "I asked him to turn off my _Empathy_. I have ten minutes with it off."

And then she reached out and laid a hand on his arm. No pain shot through her. No agony of feeling his emotions. Only a pleasant shock as their skin met. "Y-you did?" His voice was hoarse.

"I did. There's something I want to try, that might not be fair to you, but…can I kiss you?" Satsuto was silent, clearly shocked, for a few long moments, and she quickly backtracked. "I just wanted to try once…without it hurting. But I understand if you don't want to." She laughed a little. "That bad side effect of this is that now I don't actually know if you want me anymore."

Satsuto leaned towards her and laced his hands across the back of her neck, resting his arms on her shoulders. "I do still want you. I was shocked that you would be willing to kiss me. And believe me—for this, I'm perfectly willing to be your guinea pig."

"Thank you." But she didn't move. She just stood there, relishing in the feeling of the weight of his arms on her shoulders, on his fingers moving up and down on the back of her neck. Relishing in the feeling of someone touching her and it not hurting.

So Satsuto took a step towards her, so their bodies were almost pressed against each other, and pressed his lips to hers, pulling her upper body towards his. She melted into him for a moment, feeling their lips meld together, his tongue trace her lips.

And the kiss deepened as she opened her mouth for his tongue, and when he finally pulled back, both of them were panting. He grinned. "For someone who isn't used to kissing, you're pretty good at it."

"Thank you." Her hand moved up to her face without her noticing, and she began tracing her lips with her finger, feeling the echo of his lips on hers. "So are you." And then she paused, thinking. "I guess part of the reason I wanted to do this was also to figure out how I felt about you. It's almost impossible for me to tell, when we spend so much time together, what feelings are mine and what feelings are yours. But when I can't feel your emotions…I can sort things out better."

"And?"

Oujou grinned suddenly. "And…you're good at kissing. I'll give you that."

He touched her cheek, gently, softly. "But will you give…_us…_a chance?"

Closing her eyes, Oujou leaned into his hand for a moment; when she opened them, her eyes were unreadable. "If I make it through this, I'll try."

A grin lit up his face before he pulled her towards him again for another kiss. "Thank you," he gasped when they pulled apart. "Thank you so much."

And she kissed him again.

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**Aah. Don't hate me. I'm sorry. I had to do that. Really. Please review. Thanks.**


	42. It Begins

**I wrote this all today. I might suck. I haven't proof-read it. Just tell me if there are mistakes. Please enjoy. And I have found that delirious rambling is really, really easy when you've been awake for 21 or 22 hours already. I found that out at 3 in the morning a few months ago when I was staying at school overnight. It wasn't this chapter. But it's related.**

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_Pain is why I did that then, and why you do this now._

_~Blake Allen_

There was a knock on the door, and Oujou and Satsuto pulled away from each other, moving towards the door at the sound of Jason's voice. "I need to turn your _Empathy _back on," he told Oujou through the door. "I'll do it in there."

Oujou tugged on the bottom of her shirt to straighten it out, then pulled open the door; Jason stood smirking in the doorway, his expression smug. "I see you've been making the best of your time with no…barriers between the two of you."

Oujou didn't even bother to respond to that comment. Instead, she asked, "Why is it better for you to turn it back on in here?"

Jason sighed. "This is going to hurt like hell, and the fewer people you're around when I turn it back on, the better."

"That won't help much," she told him. "I can—could—feel emotions throughout the entire school. A few walls won't help much."

"They'll help." And then he walked over to a chair by Satsuto's desk and pointed to it, telling her, "Sit down." When Oujou obeyed, Jason crouched down next to her, speaking to Satsuto even as he placed two fingers on each of Oujou's temples. "It would be better if you left the room. She can't sense my emotions, but she can sense yours, and it's going to hurt her."

Satsuto sighed, then walked over to the door. Before he left, though, he told Jason, "Don't touch her more than you have to."

Jason's only response was "Try to ignore the screams."

The door slammed behind Satsuto, and Jason grinned up at Oujou. "Unfortunately, I wasn't kidding about the screaming part. Or the hurting like hell part."

Oujou just raised an eyebrow. "Do you think I'm not used to it? Just get on with it. I want to get back to work."

"You didn't want to get back to work a second ago." Oujou's hand lashed out and hit the back of his head, and his grin grew.

And then his expression went completely flat, and he pressed his fingers harder on her temples. "Relax. And I'm serious. If you fight me, I'm going to hurt you. And I really don't want to do that."

Oujou took in a deep breath and relaxed her body as well as she could; her leg jittered up and down near his body until he leaned his elbow on it to stop it. "I'm serious," he repeated. "If you want me to, I can get your body to relax, but it would be better if you could get yourself to relax."

Oujou tried again to calm her body, but she couldn't stop fidgeting—she wasn't used to being this close to someone, to touching someone, without it hurting. Finally, she bit out, "You do it." She hated to give that to him, to allow him that power over her, but she had to get back to work.

Satsuto's fingers traced around her temples, smooth, rhythmic movements, and warmth moved through her body from his fingers down through her throat, leaving her body feeling limp and her mind feeling as though it was filled with jelly.

For a moment, she tried to fight it instinctively, fighting it simply because it was _him_ controlling her, instead of _her_ controlling her, but then she was overrun by the feeling of peace that she just couldn't fight against because she didn't have the will or the energy to.

And then he murmured, "This will hurt."

Pain, hot, overwhelming, _blinding_ pain shot through her, images, emotions, so many emotions, so much pain, broken, broken people, broken bones, broken hearts, heartache, homesick, frantic, dark, dangerous, happy, too happy, light, dark, too much light, too much dark, too many people, people, so many people—

People all around, too many people, nobody, but there was everybody, everybody, they were all there, nobody, all feeling, too much feeling, but no feeling, nothing, from _him_, and she clung onto that, clung onto nothing, basked in nothing, but there was everything, and she was everything—

And how could she have been so blind, she was so blind, but now she could see, but she couldn't see, she could _feel_, could feel, _feel_, too much to feel, she didn't want to feel, didn't want to see, she was so _blind, _why couldn't she still be blind?

Why couldn't she still be blind?

"Oujou." There was nothing from him. Nothing. Thank God. "Oujou, Oujou, ssh. Ssh. I know it hurts, but you can't keep on fighting me, or it's going to damage your mind. And I'm not God, Oujou. I can't—"

There was so much _sound_, and she couldn't hear him again.

She wanted to be blind again, but she had to see, had to feel, had to be everyone and no one at the same time, because otherwise she couldn't do it.

"Oujou. I can't help you with the pain unless you relinquish some control to me. I know I could control you before, but I'm too tired to do that without risking causing you more pain, and that would defeat the whole purpose of doing this."

There was so much goddamn pain.

"Shit, Oujou, you're—" _pain_ "yourself. Stop it." _Pain painpainpainpain WHY COULDN'T SHE STILL BE BLIND?!_

"Shit!" Nothing hands touched her, held her down, and then the same warmth from before—forever ago—and everything softened. The pain died down, but didn't go away, and she let herself open her eyes and see.

Jason's face was directly in front of her, his eyes two inches from hers; his entire face relaxed, and he smiled, leaning back. "Finally."

"How long have I been—"

"Screaming? A little over six minutes." Her hand rose to rub her throat; blood was dribbling down her cheek from the side of her mouth, and she wiped it away with her thumb.

"Damn." Oujou tried to stand, but Jason's nothing hands held her down. "Let me up."

Jason shook his head. "No. You are _not_ getting up for another five minutes. Your body just had a giant shock, and it's still adjusting. In case you already forgot, you just spent the past six minutes screaming bloody murder and bleed from your mouth and nose."

Oujou moved her hand up to her nose and found that she had trails of blood coming from her nostrils as well. "Then at least bring me up to speed."

"People are training. Not much happened. All of the Safehouse people have been brought up to speed and they've been training under Hyuuga."

Oujou nodded. "So nothing. Nothing's happening. That's awesome." Her voice was sarcastic. "I want to get this goddamn thing done with."

Raising an eyebrow, Jason told her, "Most people aren't really looking forward to a war starting."

"I'm not going to live through it."

"Shouldn't that be more of a reason _not_ to be looking forward to it?"

Oujou didn't answer.

"Get out here!" The voice was Satsuto's, and it came from right outside the door. "They're here.

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**I WANT REVIEWS! I hope you enjoyed it, and please review.**


	43. Invasion

**I'm really sorry for taking so long. Really really really sorry. I just couldn't get the chapter written.**

_Given the choice between the experience of pain and nothing, I would choose pain._

_~William Faulkner_

"_Get out here!" The voice was Satsuto's, and it came from right outside the door. "They're here."_

Oujou swore under her breath, jumping to her feet; Jason opened his mouth, looking as though he wanted to stop her, then sighed, shut his mouth, and followed after her out of the room.

"If you decide to run half-assed out there," he told her, "you're just going to get yourself killed. Don't you dare."

Oujou shot him a look, then walked back into the room that had been designated as the headquarters. "I'm not going out into the field at the moment. I'm going to be dealing with strategy right now."

Jason nodded, then grabbed the arm of the Safehouse girl that was racing out of the room. "You aren't going out there."

Oujou rolled her eyes, then sat down at a chair by a computer and put on a headset.

"I am going out there," the girl in sunglasses snapped at Jason.

"No you're not. The whole point of your ability is that you don't need to be out there." He began pulling her out of the room, but the girl yanked away from him.

"Get off of me, Jason," she snapped at him, switching to English from Japanese. "I'm here for a reason."

Jason grabbed her arm again. "I don't give a damn. Do what you're supposed to do _inside_. You are _not_ going out there."

"I'm blind," she reminded him bitterly, "not stupid. I know I can't control the world like you can, but I can help."

Jason tightened his grip on her, leaning close. "You are going to stay in here. I don't care what the hell you want to do. You are staying _in here_."

"No"—she yanked at his grip—"I'm not."

"Stop arguing," Oujou snapped at them from her chair; she was typing on the keyboard, and she pulled open Hotaru's program. "You aren't small children; don't act like them. Jason, what's your problem with her going out there?"

Jason glared at Oujou. "It's not your problem; don't worry about it."

Oujou turned to look at him then, her eyebrow raised incredulously. "At the moment, you're all under my command. So what the hell is your problem with her going out there? And be quick about it; I need to get to work."

Jason's glare intensified. "She's blind, Oujou. And she can do her work perfectly well from in here."

"But I'm more useful out there," she countered, trying again to yank away from him.

"Why did you bring her here, then?" Oujou demanded, and Jason grimaced.

Jason glanced at the blind girl, then back at Oujou. "It wasn't my choice. I didn't want to bring her here, and I don't want her here."

"I got that," the girl snapped.

"Yeah," Oujou said, "so did I. Go out there and take someone to guard you and relay the recon back to us."

Jason spun to face the girl completely, yanked her up towards him and took possession of her mouth with his. Oujou stared at them for a second, then turned back to her chair, a small smile on her mouth.

"Don't you dare get hurt," Jason growled at her in English, "Or I swear to God I will kill all of the bastards who dared to try to kill you. And if you get yourself killed…" He didn't finish the sentence, but the sentiment was clear.

The girl nodded, then headed out of the room; dryly, Oujou asked, "A tad overprotective, are we?"

Jason turned to look at her, one eyebrow raised sardonically. "Why ever would you think that?"

An hour later, they had a problem.

"The healers' building has been attacked," a tinny voice reported through the crackling speakers. "No one is dead, but some of the healers are unconscious or gravely wounded."

"What happened to Imai Subaru?" Oujou demanded, focusing on the healer's center on her map of the grounds. It should have been protected. "And how the hell did they get in there?"

"No idea. We think they have teleporters."

Awesome. "Great. Where the hell is Imai Subaru?"

There was a pause, and when the voice came back, it was strained. "Trying to save the life of everyone in the healer's center using Tonouchi's _Amplification_ stones. He's going to kill himself with the overload."

"Then stop him."

There was another pause, then the voice said, "We don't know how to."

Oujou spun in her chair to look at Hotaru. "Go tell your brother to stop killing himself and do something useful."

Hotaru raised an eyebrow, then began speaking into her radio on the channel that the healers were using. Her voice was low, but about thirty seconds later, she slammed her fist against the table and snarled, "You are not going to kill yourself to save everyone else, dammit."

And then, a second later, the tinny voice reported to Oujou, "He finally stopped. And—shit."

For another few seconds, there was only static, and then the voice reported, "Three people just died. _Shit_."

"Stop swearing," Oujou ordered, "and tell me what the hell is going on."

The voice was frantic now, and it came out more static-y than before. "It's like there's a minefield. The ground is exploding." Oujou heard a crash and some muffled screaming, and then the voice reported, "We need someone with an _Earth_ alice here _now_."

Oujou picked up her walkie-talkie and opened up the alice list on her other monitor, searching for anyone with an earth-type alice. There were four of them, but only two were old for her to involve in it. Only one wasn't being used for something that they needed them for, so she contacted Jinno.

"I need Tomoyo Hikari," she told Jinno. "Send her to the main checkpoint and give her a headset."

"She'll be there within five minutes."

Oujou looked at her watch, grimaced, and opened the channel that would contact everyone with a headset. "The first rotation of the unlimited alice types will come out now. In an hour, the next rotation and the first rotation of the dangerous ability will come out. You will rotate every hour."

She changed do a different channel, hoping that this would be enough to keep any of them from collapsing with overload. "Hyuuga."

After a pause, Natsume's voice came through, asked, "What do you need?"

"Has your group lost anyone?"

There was a static-filled sigh, and then Natsume reported, "Not yet, but Yamanouchi Shizune and Goshima Hijiri are both injured and the ground is exploding ev—_shit_." The crash that came through the microphone was loud enough to make Oujou's ears ache.

"We're having someone with an _Earth_ alice come try to deal with that. Do you know what the hell is causing it?"

"Who," he said, "and we're trying to figure it out. There are so many goddamn AAO people. You have the computer program. What does it say?"

Goddamn. Oujou looked at program, and it took her a second to pinpoint where the person was that could be doing that. _Bomb_ alice.

"Thirty feet in front of you," she reported, "and eight to the right. Two people. _Bomb_ alice and _Shield _alice."

"Received," Natsume responded. "And don't get yourself killed."

**There are a few chapters left, and then there's going to be an epilogue. Please review. **


	44. Turn Them Back

**Done with this chapter.**

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_So fades a summer cloud away;_  
_So sinks the gale when storms are o'er;_  
_So gently shuts the eye of day;_  
_So dies a wave along the shore._

_~Anna Laetitia Barbauld p. 176. _

"We got Youichi," Natsume reported. "He's being brought inside by Yakumo Hajime. What room should he be put in?"

Oujou looked over at Jason, who told her, "I'll be in the room two doors over. Once the kid's in there, don't come in for any reason. I will likely kill anyone if they come in without warning. When the next people come in, contact me. Do _not_ let them come in here without my say-so."

Oujou relayed the information to Natsume, then watched as Jason walked out of the room. Coppery wetness touched her lips and she wiped it away; she swore under her breath when she saw blood on her hand, tipping back her head and pressing a tissue to it.

"Shit." Her pulse thudded in her forehead, and she closed her eyes, groaning. She contacted Natsume again, asking, "Hyuuga, what the hell is Sakura doing?"

Natsume's response came back immediately. "She's currently blocking fifteen AAO members from using their alices. _Shit_." A loud crash sounded through her headset, and she swore under her breath, tasting blood on her tongue. She coughed wetly for a second, then frowned as Natsume told her dryly, "It helps to spit it out before you trying swallowing."

Oujou spit the blood out into a tissue from the tissue box, then responded, "Thanks. Glad to hear that you have experience with this sort of thing. What the hell just happened?"

"Ground blew up."

Oujou swore under her breath, checking the map on her computer. Tomoyo Hikari was there. "What the hell is Tomoyo Hikari doing?"

There was some static, and then Natsume answered, "Fighting them. But she's a kid, and this person is a hell of a lot stronger than she is. Hang on—Tonouchi Akira is going to her."

Oujou sighed, taking another tissue and wiping the blood from between her nose and her mouth. "Get the goddamn explosions dealt with. If you have to, have Sakura focus on the _Bomb_ alice person. But we need that dealt with _now_."

"We will. And take a break. If you pass out in the middle of this, you're no good to any of us."

And then he broke contact.

Oujou tilted her head back, pressing on the bridge of her nose to try to stop the bleeding, and then groaned as the flow of blood from her nose just sped up.

"What the hell is going on?" Satsuto's voice demanded from behind her, and she groaned again. "Why is your nose bleeding?"

"My body's shutting down," she told him. "It's been happening for a long time, as you well know."

"I'm getting Jason," he told her, but she shook her head immediately, turning to face him.

"He's helping people who were taken by the AAO. He said not to interrupt him. It should stop soon."

"Goddamn." He dropped into the chair next to hers, staring at her. "Goddamn. Don't kill yourself. Please, Oujou, goddamn it, don't kill yourself. We need you alive. I need you alive."

Oujou's lips tightened, and then she got the notice from Natsume that they had gotten Yuu Tobita into custody, and she took that as a chance to end the conversation with Satsuto so she could report it to Jason.

"Tell them to knock before they come in," was his only response.

* * *

Jason closed his eyes, focusing again on the little boy's mind. It was a mess—a tangle of urges and desires and orders and feelings and all the crap Reo had stuffed into his mind.

Carefully, slowly, he continued to unweave the disaster area that the man had left in the little boy's mind.

A knock on the door distracted him, and he sent out a wave of his power out before he could help it, reining back just in time to keep from killing whatever poor bastards were outside the door, waiting for him to respond.

Instead, he just opened the door with his power, gentling it so he wouldn't rip the thing off its hinges or blow it up, and waved the people in. It was a boy with yellow-blond hair and glasses who was resisting the tall boy who was dragging him inside the room.

"Come in," Jason told them. "He won't fight me." He touched Youichi's mind again, checked to see that it was, in fact, clear of the taint that Reo had left in it, and looked back at Yakumo Hajime, examining the bandage on the teenager's face for a second. "You can take the kid to another room, but don't let him fight. His mind's fractured, and he'll take a few days to recover."

The teen nodded, picked up the boy, and left the room, closing the door behind him. Jason looked at the new boy, then told him, "Calm down." He only forced only a little bit of his power onto the boy; Reo had made him so pliable that he could have practically just said the words and the boy would have listened.

"Sit in front of me," he ordered, and the boy walked over, complacent as a young, innocent child, and sat, looking up at him with large, glasses-shielded eyes. "Close your eyes."

He couldn't stand to see his eyes. He couldn't stand to see those child-like, innocent eyes of a manipulated child. He had manipulated enough people before he had changed his mind and decided to stop being an awful son of a bitch and actually help people.

Jason closed his eyes, laid two fingers on each of the boy's temples, and sent his power into the boy's tangled, pliable mind. He was tired, but he knew that most of the rest of the people were exhausted. Oujou was going to die.

The boy whimpered, and he relaxed the power on his mind, gentling his touch. "Calm."

Ten thousand lies. Ten thousand lives. He was such a freaking coward, such a disgusting, horrible bastard.

This was the only way he could redeem himself.

* * *

Oujou swallowed an anti-unlimited alice type pill dry, not wanting to get up to get water for it when she didn't need it. She was exhausted, and it had probably been about thirty hours since she had last actually slept.

God, her head hurt. It had probably been hurting for twenty of those past thirty hours, and she had had a nose bleed twice more since the first time.

"Shit," she muttered under her breath for what had to be the hundredth time, "I need pain meds."

A hand appeared in front of her face with a small pill on it, and a glass of water was set down on the table beside her. "Special delivery," Satsuto told her. "Get some rest. You are allowed to take a break, you know."

She sighed, took the pill, and contemplated it for a second before asking, "is this a pain med or a sleeping pill?"

He smiled at her. "Yes."

"Damn it, Satsuto, I can't afford to go to sleep."

And then Natsume's voice came through the headset, and she knew she couldn't afford to go to sleep for a while longer. "Shit. Goddamn. No. No. Goddamn. No. No. No. Damn it." Natsume's litany of profanities continued until Oujou demanded, "What the hell is going on, Hyuuga?"

Natsume answered immediately with, "I'm coming to you. I need a healer. Imai Subaru. Immediately."

Oujou contacted Subaru immediately, then asked Natsume, "What happened?"

Natsume broke off from his continued muttering profanities to answer, "Mikan was shot. Damn it, stop bleeding. You will stop bleeding, goddamn it."

She guessed those last two sentences weren't directed towards her, so she ignored them. "How badly hurt is she?"

"She's been _shot_."

Goddamn. "Bring her to the headquarters." She switched to contacting Jason, and told him, "I need you to come back in here."

Jason's response came a few seconds later, and he sounded strained. "Why?"

"I need you to keep me from killing myself."

A few moments later, Jason stalked into the room, followed within a few seconds by Natsume, who shoved past the blond boy, carrying a bleeding Mikan in his arms.

Natsume set her down on the floor, brushing a lock of hair out of her pale face. "Save her," he demanded, putting pressure on the wound; Oujou knelt down beside the girl and motioned Jason over.

"I need to take off some of my control devices. Jason, keep me conscious. I need to save her. If you have to take control of my mind, do it. She's all that matters."

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**Okay, there are, like, two chapters left. Please review. Thanks.**


	45. Saving Lives

**Hi. Next chapter. Have fun. Or don't.**

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_Life's but a walking shadow, a poor player that struts and frets his hour upon the stage, and then is heard no more: it is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing._

_~William Shakespeare in __Macbeth_

"_I need to take off some of my control devices. Jason, keep me conscious. I need to save her. If you have to take control of my mind, do it. She's all that matters."_

Oujou pulled off two of the control devices from her arm, and Jason put his hands on her temples. "Hyuuga. Shut up, calm down, and get your hands off of her. She's dead, and I need to bring her back to life, so _back the hell off_."

Natsume moved his hands an inch away from Mikan's skin and quieted his continuous stream of muttered words, but didn't stop it. Oujou put her hands on Mikan's stomach, took in a deep breath, and closed her eyes, concentrating.

Jason's eyes went cloudy, and his hands flattened against her skin as he took in a deep breath. "Put your hand on her pulse point, but don't touch her anywhere else. As soon as you feel her pulse, create a fire in front of me. Neither of us will hear you if you say anything to us…. When Imai…comes in…tell him…not…to touch…her…."

His voice faded, and his eyes closed as he leaned Oujou back against his chest. A slight glow appeared on Oujou's hands, and her body went completely rigid, then slumped completely back against Jason, limp.

A moment later, Subaru burst into the room and knelt down beside the group of teens, demanding, "What the hell are they doing?" His eyes flew to Oujou and Jason, then went back to Mikan, who was still lying, lifeless, on the ground. "Why isn't she in the healer's area?"

"Oujou's bringing her back to life. Don't touch her." Subaru yanked his hand away from Mikan and moved over to Oujou and Jason, both of whom were sitting, motionless, on the floor with Oujou's hands on Mikan and Jason's hands on Oujou's head.

"She's going to kill herself," Subaru hissed at Natsume, reaching towards the girl.

"Don't touch her," Natsume ordered, grabbing the healer's arm to stop him. "If you try to stop her, I will rip you limb from limb. As soon as Mikan is back to life, you will heal her."

Subaru leaned back and examined Natsume for a second, then told him, "I will heal her once they have finished, but—"

"Shut the hell up."

Natsume looked back down at Mikan, pressing his fingers even farther into Mikan's neck as though that would somehow restart her pulse. Suddenly, he tensed, moving his head closer to Mikan.

He waved his hand towards the two teenagers, who were slumped against each other, and a small flame appeared in front of Jason's face. The flame went out immediately, and Jason pulled Oujou back from Mikan, snapping, "Begin healing her immediately." When Subaru hesitated for a second, Jason hissed, "We will not be able to bring her back a second time so _start healing her now, goddamn it_."

Subaru moved to Mikan and laid his hands over the wounds; Hotaru stared over at the teenagers sitting around the body of her friend, his eyes flat.

Jason held Oujou against him for a moment, then laid her flat out on the floor, stroking a lock of hair out of her face. At that moment, Satsuto burst into the room and rushed over to her, but Jason blocked his way, snapping, "If you touch her, you could kill her. Her mind will not be able to handle the emotions, and if you touch her before I help her, you could overload her mind and it could kill her so _back the hell off_ before I knock you out and lock you in a small dark room until this is done."

Satsuto sat on the ground beside Oujou, sighing; Jason set a hand on Oujou's forehead, using the other to brush stray strands of black hair out of her pale face. "Hush," he murmured, even though Oujou hadn't said anything aloud. "Quiet, Kanjouinyuu. Nothing will hurt you. I will not hurt you. The headmaster is going to touch your skin. Focus on that touch."

He grabbed Satsuto's hand and yanked it towards Oujou's forehead, pressing it against her skin. Oujou shuddered violently once, then went still again. "If you focus on his touch, you won't feel the emotions. I know feeling the emotions hurts. Please, Oujou, concentrate on his touch. If you can't block out the emotions from that, concentrate on my touch."

Satsuto's gaze went to Jason for a second, his eyes hostile, then returned to Oujou's nearly-still figure.

"I'm in control," Jason continued. "I will not let you hurt anyone. Trust me, Kanjouinyuu. I will not let you hurt anyone. We are all safe." A second later, a low breath hissed out of his mouth, and he snapped down at the girl, "_Damn it all, Oujou_, will you listen to me? I will knock you out and not let you wake up until this goddamn battle is over. _Jesus Christ_," he snapped in English, then returned to Japanese to tell her, "Focus on something other than the pain. I swear to God, you will not hurt anyone if you let go for _one minute_.

"One minute," he continued, softer but barely less angry, "and then you'll be better. If you let go for a minute, everything will get better, but if you don't, this will just hurt you more."

Oujou went ramrod stiff, then slumped down completely, and Jason smiled. "Good girl. Stop being such a masochist and just—yes. Okay. And you won't hurt anyone. I promise."

Oujou's hand closest to Satsuto twitched, and Jason grabbed Satsuto's hand, shoving it into Oujou's grip. "Hold her hand," he told the headmaster. "It isn't going to hurt her right now."

Satsuto curled his fingers around Oujou's and watched as she trembled slightly; Jason had his fingers on her temples, and his eyes were closed. He looked relaxed, but Satsuto knew he wasn't.

"Can she actually hear you?" Satsuto asked after a moment of quiet. "Can she hear…us?"

Jason nodded. "She isn't deaf. She just isn't completely conscious at the moment. I'm essentially keeping her half asleep while I try to heal the damage in her brain. It's pretty much a patch job, but I can't do much better at the moment."

He stroked back a lock of Oujou's hair, then moved a few inches back from her. "She'll wake up in about a minute. Don't let her get up for another five. There's not much else I can do at the moment. If she starts bleeding for her nose, ears, mouth, whatever like that, get me."

And then he stood and walked back towards Mikan.

* * *

Ninari Misa raised her hands in the air, then placed them on the ground, calling up all the dead in the land. There were a lot of dead, and most of them were young. Children.

Practically babies.

Thy rose from the earth, their bodies half-rotted, some barely more than skeletons, and shook off the dirt and the rot and stood at attention before her, demanding, _What do you ask of us, mistress? We are here to do your bidding._

The same words every time, and she hated them. Hated all of them.

Disgusting.

"Kill the members of the AAO." She didn't have to speak aloud to command them, but she felt obligated to. Just like she felt obligated to help the school that had tried so hard to kill her so long ago.

They were just children, just poor dead children, and she was ordering them to kill. Goddamn it.

Goddamn her.

_Yes, mistress. We live to serve you, mistress._

Wasn't that ironic. They didn't live for anything. They were dead.

"Be careful."

She didn't want their poor, small bodies to be destroyed even more than they had to be.

She was such a monster.

* * *

Oujou let herself drift for another few, precious moments, her mind blissfully free from pain and terror for once. And probably for the last time in her entire life.

A hand was in hers, warm, male by the feel of it, long-fingered. Satsuto's.

Perhaps she could allow herself just another moment of peace.

"Oujou, please, wake up. We need you."

No. For once, she didn't want to wake up, and damn them for needing her. She wanted to just…sleep for a while.

Just sleep. Was that too much to ask for?

Apparently so.

Her eyes opened, and it took a minute for her vision to clear enough for her to be able to see his face. He looked worried.

He always looked worried around her.

She tried to sit down, but he held her down with a hand on her shoulder, saying, "Jason said five minutes before you can get up. And if you start bleeding again, tell me."

She closed her eyes, then opened them again and said, "I need to go out there."

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**Okay, one chapter left and them the epilogue. Please review.**

**I had said that, when I finished this, I would post the sequel of Bleach fanfic, but I'm actually considering writing a Jason story. What do you think? I'm going to put a poll on the profile sometime soon.**


	46. The End

**Here it is. Enjoy.**

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_Death hath a thousand doors to let out life:  
I shall find one._

_~Philip Massinger, __A Very Woman, V. iv._

"_I need to go out there."_

Satsuto shook his head, his eyes wide. "No. No way in hell."

"If I'm going to kill myself, I'm at least going to choose how I'm going to die." Oujou sat up, shoving him away and leaning back against the wall so she didn't fall over.

Satsuto grimaced as he moved over to her. "No, you aren't."

Oujou looked over at Natsume, who was staring down at Mikan, who had woken up. "Forever," Natsume was saying, "I'll be with you forever. I'm not letting you go."

Oujou raised her voice so he would hear her, saying, "Hyuuga, you're in charge. I pass all responsibility onto you. You cannot pass it along to the headmaster or to any of the teachers."

Natsume looked at her, then answered, "Hell no."

"You have no choice. I have given power over to you and I'm not taking it back so don't even try."

She tried to stand, found she couldn't, and sat back down, grimacing. "In about five minutes, I'm going outside to help fight. That's nonnegotiable, Hyuuga."

Natsume sighed, then turned back to Mikan. Satsuto stared at her, then told her, "If you're going out there, so am I."

Oujou shook her head. "No, you're not."

"You gave up power," he reminded her, "so you can't order me around. I'm going out there."

"You aren't going to get yourself killed, Satsuto-san. You aren't going to do this. You—" She was cut off as Satsuto fitted his mouth to hers, cupping the back of her head and pulling her towards him.

She struggled for half a second, then relaxed against him, pressing against him, molding her body to his.

Finally, she pulled back from him and, panting, told him, "I'm not letting you get yourself killed. You need to stay alive. I need you alive."

"If you're dead, you don't need me alive. Now shut the hell up. You aren't going out there alone." She stood, leaning back against the wall to keep her balance. "I order you to stay in here."

Oujou shook her head. "Not going to work, _headmaster_. Don't even try it." She walked over to the table and picked up a more mobile headset, putting it in her ear. "This is Oujou Kanjouinyuu. I have officially transferred all control to Hyuuga Natsume. I will be in the field as part of the offense." She sighed, then finished her message to everyone with, "You've done well."

She switched to a line that only Natsume could contact, then said, "I'm going outside in two minutes."

Then she walked over to her desk and grabbed the container of Anti-Unlimited Alice pills, swallowing two dry.

She sat at the desk for a moment, her head in her hands, her eyes closed, then after a few minutes had passed, stood, rubbing the heel of her hands against her temples.

"I'm going outside," she told them, then picked up the gun from beside her computer, slipped it into her holster, and walked out of the room.

As soon as she got outside, she was greeted by one of the people who were guarding the building; he was a Dangerous Ability kid, but not one that she knew personally.

He nodded to her as she walked out the door, saying, "Good luck, and thank you."

She didn't want him to thank her. She just wanted him to stay alive. She just wanted all of them to stay alive, and she wasn't good for them. She wasn't helpful.

She was probably going to get them all killed.

She nodded back, then ran to the closest checkpoint to that entrance of the building. The person stationed there was Tonouchi Akira, who was pumping out alice-enhancer stones as quickly as he could.

"I heard your message," Akira told her when she reached him; he was pale and sweat was running down his temples in streams. "Death by the enemy. There are much less painful ways to commit suicide."

She frowned at him. "It isn't suicide. It's—"

He smiled tiredly. "I'm not going to argue with you. Just remember that giving up your life for nothing is never worth it."

"Isn't peace worth it?"

Akira just continued to smile at her. "We need people in the Northern Forest. You can help there. I'll tell the checkpoint person there that you're coming. I'd advise checking in with him."

She nodded. "Sure. Thanks." She paused. "Thank you. Thank you for…for everything."

"Don't get all sentimental on me, Oujou-chan. Go. And goodbye."

Of course he knew.

She ran to the Northern Forest checkpoint person, Tsubasa Andou, her gun out in case she came across any AAO members. She didn't, which would have been odd had she not been able to see large explosions and the sound of gunfire coming from another part of the campus.

Tsubasa grinned at her when she reached him, saying, "I heard from Tono-san. Glad you're here to help. Can you just pull the life from all the bad guys?"

Oujou shook her head. "No. My control isn't that good, and I'd end up killing everyone."

Tsubasa sighed. "I guess we wouldn't want that, would we?"

"The headmaster's coming out here to fight."

Tsubasa's eyes widened, and he swore under his breath, his hand clenching into a fist. "Goddamn it. Why?"

"Because that was his requirement for me coming out here to fight. Get him distracted and keep him from getting killed."

A sigh escaped from Tsubasa's lips again. "I know my job. I won't get him killed. I don't want him out here any more than you do."

She nodded. "I know. I'm going now."

She moved towards the forest, her gun out but pointed down, touching her wrist sheath to reassure herself that she had a knife there. It probably would help little if she was actually going to be fighting someone, because alices often made hand-to-hand combat obsolete.

"You lost, little girl?" a man's voice asked from somewhere to the right and in front of her. She tried to search for him using her alices, but there were too many people near her and she was too tired. It was also almost nighttime, and the forest, with the shade from the trees blanketing the ground, was as dark as though it was nearly midnight.

She swung towards where she had heard his voice, but there were footsteps, too, way too many of them, and she couldn't tell which of them were from him and which were from others. Which were from friend and which were from foe.

"You look like a kid. They sending kids to fight us, now?" The same man, but he was more in front of her now, instead of to her right. Shit. She couldn't follow him like this.

Oujou slipped off one of the armband alice control devices, and suddenly everything was more clear, including the pain shooting through her head. Shit. Shit shit shit shit shit.

But she could find him now, and she could feel him moving. He could tell where she was, someone, she didn't know how, and he didn't want to be fighting her. The reason why was bleary, but it felt like he didn't want to be fighting a kid.

The man moved closer, and she tried to lock onto him with her powers, but she couldn't. Shit. She couldn't. Either something was blocking her, or she was just too tired, too exhausted to focus that much. She hadn't pulled the life from someone that far away from her before, not that she knew of, and she just couldn't get a lock on him well enough to do that.

She might kill someone. She could kill someone else.

Could she really kill someone else? Would that be what happened if she tried?

Could she risk it?

Could she?

Shit.

She pulled off another control device, and another shot of intense, mind-shattering pain shot through her head, but everything became even more clear, even more painfully clear, like she was nearly blind and continued putting on better and better glasses, like she hadn't realized she had been blind and it was only now that she could see better that she knew she hadn't really been able to see before.

But it wasn't with her eyes that she could see, but with her mind. She could see the discomfort he felt from having invaded a school; the fear that maybe, perhaps, somehow, these children were stronger than him; the arrogance that of course they weren't; the unhappiness at having to fight children; the desire to go home and not be part of this; the wishing to not be a freak, not anymore; and so much more.

It was like, for half a second, she was him, and she processed everything he was feeling, better than he would ever have been able to, because she wasn't him and she had a perspective on him that he would never have on himself.

She got little, extra blips from all those around her, all those for God knew how far, but she was focusing on this one man, and so that was who she was seeing.

He moved closer, one foot. Two feet.

She could track him now, but it was hurting. It hurt. A lot.

She wasn't going to be able to do this.

"You're going to just stand there, little girl? Just stand there? Didn't they teach you how to fight?" He was stalling. She knew the man was stalling. She could feel him want to stall for time. She didn't know why, but she knew without a shadow of a doubt that he was stalling.

"Well, if you aren't going to attack me…."

His laugh echoed a little through the forest. "I'm the head of my group, little girl. Trying to goad me isn't going to work."

Well she was the head of the entire operation, or at least she had been before, but she didn't really think that she needed to tell him that.

He was a lot closer now, close enough that she could suck the life out of him. So she did. She leaned back against a tree so she didn't collapse and sucked the life out of him. The amount of energy she got—because she had learned that she got energy from those that she sucked the energy out of—was barely enough to make up for what she was losing just having these two control devices off.

She was going to die soon. Sooner than she had thought. Sooner than anyone had thought.

So she was going to go out with a bang. She was going to go out saving as many lives as she could.

Oujou began pulling her control devices off, one by one; it got harder to move, harder to think, as she pulled each one off. It also became clearer. Everything did. Everything became crystal clear, clear as though she could see everything, _everything_, and she understood all of it.

The world pulsed and throbbed with life and emotion and power, and _Power_ flooded into her, rich, hot, intoxicating, strong, _magnificent._

She could see everyone, she was everyone, and she could feel everything, sense everything, know everything, and she was everything and she was everyone and she was nothing but herself, but she wasn't even herself anymore.

She was Satsuto and Jason and Natsume and Mikan and Hotaru and Subaru and Tsubasa and Akira and Ninari Misa and _everyone_.

Her name. She heard her name, but was it her name, did she have a name, could she have a name if she was everyone, because there was no one name for everyone, and she was not simply everyone, she was….

All.

All emotion, all power, all life.

All death.

She stepped in front of the bullet, and died.

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**I'm done.**

**Okay, I'm not completely done. There's an epilogue. I promise.**

**Please review, and remember that, if you want to see a side-story/sequel about Jason, you need to vote for it.**


	47. Epilogue

**The end.**

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The battle was finished, and Gakuen Alice had won. The Safehouse people had left as soon as their job was done, and the funerals were finished. All except one.

Oujou Kanjouinyuu's was beginning, and the entire school was congregated in rows in front of her casket. Satsuto stood in the front of the room beside Natsume, and his eyes were bloodshot and red, with dark, bruise-like shadows below them.

He walked up to the microphone in the front of the room, then began speaking, his voice hoarse and not at all steady. "We're here to honor Oujou Kanjouinyuu, the general of our school army. She was the strongest person I ever knew, and that isn't just because of the strength of her alice. She was…incredible.

"By the time I met her, Oujou knew that she was going to die soon. But instead of wallowing in despair about her upcoming…death"—he choked on the word—"she fought to become stronger and to save who she could. She didn't have to fight for us, but she did. She fought as hard as she could for us, and she saved the lives of an untold number of people.

"Likely, you will never meet another person like Oujou, and it is possible that there will never be another person that even reaches her level. She was beautiful and strong and she will be missed."

Satsuto stepped back from the microphone, tears running down his face, and Natsume stepped forward. "Oujou Kanjouinyuu will be buried on campus beside the Northern Forest. The casket will be placed there later today. You are all welcome to watch the burial. You're dismissed"

He stepped back, then walked to the side of the stage and joined Mikan and Hotaru, who were waiting for him, both dressed in all black. He spoke to them briefly, then hurried to meet up with Satsuto, who was walking back to his office.

"I need to talk to you," he told Satsuto. "We're going to your office."

Satsuto glanced over at him, his face streaked with tears, then shook his head. "I don't want to talk to you," he mumbled, "so go away."

Natsume just walked with him to his office anyway, and when Satsuto tried to keep him out, Natsume propped the door open with his foot, then followed inside after him. Satsuto slumped down at his desk, and Natsume sat down in front of it, staring at his headmaster.

"I told you," Natsume said, "we need to talk."

Satsuto set his head down on the table. "I don't want to talk."

"Well too damn bad. Stop sulking."

Satsuto's head went up at that, and he swept his arm across the desk, knocking all of the papers off the desk; they went flying everywhere in the room, then finally settled onto the floor, covering it with white. "I'm not sulking. I'm mourning. What do you want, Hyuuga?"

"You need to wake up. Stop sulking. Stop hiding. This school was just ripped to pieces and you're hiding in here like a coward."

"She told me she would give me a chance," Satsuto announced.

Natsume rested his elbows on his knees and sighed. "She knew she was going to die. You know that just as well as I do."

"But she was going to give me a chance," Satsuto insisted. "We would have had a chance together. We could have been happy together."

"And even if she had lived, how long would she have survived?" Natsume leaned towards Satsuto. "How long would you have lived together before you would have had to watch her die? She knew you weren't going to have a chance to really be together."

"But we would have had some time. We would have been able to be together."

"And then she would have died a horrible, painful death. Do you think I don't know how damn much this hurts? This way, at least, she got to choose the way she went."

Satsuto slammed his fist against his desk with a thump that resounded around the room. "Damn you hell, Hyuuga. She would have—we would have been together. We would have. She promised. She promised."

"She knew she was going to die, and she told you what you wanted to hear. She gave you hope. She kept you from throwing yourself away worthlessly."

Satsuto's fist hit the desk again. "No. No, damn you. She would have gotten together with me. Damn it." His face crumpled, and tears filled his eyes. "I can't do this. Damn it. Get the hell out, Hyuuga."

Natsume stood and walked out of the office, heading towards Mikan, who was in his room. Who should be in his room. If she wasn't in his room, he was going to kill her.

After he kissed the hell out of her.

"She got what she deserved." A girl's voice came from around the corner, and when Natsume rounded the corner, he saw the girl that Oujou had broken the nose of talking to another girl. "The stupid bitch broke my nose."

"If you say anything bad about her," Natsume snapped, anger flooding through his veins, "I will you rip you apart limb by limb."

The girls jerked away from him, but then the one who had spoken before then said, "The _bitch_ was just a little coward who didn't bother to go to the front lines till the very end."

She caught fire, and Natsume walked past her without a second glance.

He didn't go back to his room, though. Something told him he had to go to Oujou's room. Maybe to say goodbye. He didn't know.

When he reached the room, he found the door closed but not locked, and he opened it without it even squeaking.

It was bare inside, sterile in its empty whiteness, with only one object marring its clinical feel. On the bed sat a piece of letter paper folded into thirds, with two words on the outside.

When Natsume approached it, he read the words: Natsume.

Inside was a letter.

_Dear Natsume, _

_You're the only one who knows the contents of this letter. You don't have to keep it that way, but you can if you want._

_You've probably spoken to Satsuto by now and know that I promised to give him a chance if I lived. You must also know that I always knew I was going to die. I know you probably won't do this, but I don't want anyone wasting away wishing I was still alive. I'm better off this way._

_I wasted my life away wishing I had had a better childhood. You know better than to do that. You have what you want—what you need. Don't let it go for anything. Don't let it go if they have to pry it out of your cold, dead hands. And don't let it get that far. Don't give your life away. Don't throw it away. Don't waste it wanting different past. And if you can't do it for yourself and you can't do it for me, do it for Sakura. _

_None of us are children anymore. Neither of us have been for a while. But don't let anyone else lose their innocence completely. I want to know that I helped save something. A few lives of people who are broken beyond repair aren't worth it._

_Don't remember me just for whatever lives I might have saved. I'm not a hero. I'm not a good guy. I was just a general of the army of children I helped life turn into warriors. Remember me for the lives I took, and the lives I destroyed. You and I both know that it never evens out._

_I just hope that whatever lives I gave my own for were worth it._

_Oujou_

_P.S. You promised Mikan forever, didn't you? Take care of her. _

_Don't tell him I'm sorry. He shouldn't have to know I wanted it too._

_

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**The end. **

**I will not be writing a sequel to my Bleach fanfic, though, eventually, I might write a story about Jason and sunglasses-girl. **

**It's over.**


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